“Well, wizard?” ’Gren demanded, his bag and Sorgrad’s slung on his back, knives ready to fight anyone who offered.

“I can’t bespeak anyone, not Usara, not Allin, not Larissa.” I heard considerable disquiet in Shiv’s voice.

“Can’t you rouse Planir or someone in Hadrumal?” Apprehension deepened Ryshad’s tone.

“Give me a moment.” Shiv set down his salver and the half-burnt rune stick and heaved a weary sigh. It wasn’t paint causing those dark hollows under his eyes, I realised with a sinking feeling. This wasn’t the time to find Shiv had spent all his wizardry, not if we couldn’t summon help from beyond these islands. What could have happened to the other mages?

“They’ll be at the boundary wall any moment now,” Ryshad warned from his vantage point.

“I can see those slackers with their spades hiding round the corner of the house,” Sorgrad said ominously.

’Gren and I stood watching Shiv work his spell once more.

“Planir, it’s me, Shiv.” The mage’s voice hardened as he bent closer to the amber radiance. “Open to my spell, curse you! I have to speak to you!”

But the light faded inexorably from the cold metal. “Don’t do this to me!” spat Shiv, heedless of the rune stick burning his fingers. He gripped the salver so hard the silver buckled. With a snap that startled us all, it twisted out of his hands to fall blackened to the floor. Shiv stared at it aghast. “The magic turned against me.”

A horrible notion struck me. “Was it the rune stick? The Forest Folk foretelling is Artifice even if they don’t call it that—”

Shiv wasn’t listening. “There’s something very wrong.”

“There will be if we can’t fight a way out of here.” Ryshad snapped his spyglass shut and shoved it in a pocket. We all drew our blades as we heard running feet on the stones of the yard.

“It’s only a double handful or so,” said ’Gren scornfully.

“Shiv, can’t you just lift us out of here?” I asked.

“Where to?” he asked, exasperated. “Olret’s keep? That’s the only other place around here I know well enough to carry us to—and that’ll just about finish me.”

“We’ve fought our way out of tighter corners than this.” ’Gren was unconcerned but then ’Gren was always unconcerned. Moving figures passed by the windows.

“It’s whoever Olret’s sent that we have to worry about.” Sorgrad assessed the situation calmly. “If we deal with them, farm boys aren’t going to stand up to us.”

Ryshad didn’t take his eyes off the door. “How do we do this?”

Sorgrad used his dagger to loosen the bone frame in the stone aperture beside him. “We let them in through the door.” The window loosened. “Then we go out this way.”

Ryshad scowled. “You three, maybe. Not me and Shiv.”

“I can slow them down,” the mage assured him.

“Once we’re out, we attack them from the back.” I resolutely ignored my own misgivings.

“No more time to worry about it.”

’Gren leapt for the door as someone lifted the latch on the other side. He ripped it open and the Elietimm soldier fell into the wash house, taken unawares. He took that surprise to whatever afterlife awaited him as ’Gren struck his head clean off before darting out of the reach of the second man’s naked blade.

“Go!” Sorgrad stood between me and the Elietimm forcing their way into the cramped building, bent on ugly slaughter. I used a pail as a step and, tossing the loosened frame aside, I went through the window feet first. ’Gren dived after me to roll on the bruising ground with all the skill of a fairground tumbler. He was on his feet, blades bright in the morning sun before Olret’s men realised what was happening.

Most were already inside the wash house. Three were left outside to gawp at our sudden arrival. Two went for ’Gren and the last ran at me. I wasn’t about to start swordplay with someone half a head taller so I ducked down and caught up a loose stone the size of my fist. Catching him full in the cheek wasn’t as good as a strike to the temple but it sent him staggering back. He fell hard on his arse so I could shove my sword under his jaw to leave him twitching on the dusty ground. I don’t kill with ’Gren’s insouciance but if someone tries to kill me, I’ll answer to Saedrin for his death when my times comes. It was only then I realised I’d taken the insane risk of using the ancient Kel Ar’Ayen blade I carried.

With deft footwork and vicious swordplay, ’Gren added the other two to a tally that’ll keep the elder god busy and everyone else waiting in line. Hearing their cries, one came back out of the door and I retreated rapidly, shoving the sword into my belt and reaching into my pouch for darts.

But he wasn’t interested in fighting, running so fast even ’Gren couldn’t catch him before he jumped the boundary wall and fled.

Curiosity warred with caution and I risked going a little closer. Two Elietimm in the doorway had their backs to me and whoever they were fighting had to be one of my friends so I darted in to hamstring the closest with my longest dagger. He fell, to be killed by Sorgrad and I caught a glimpse of Ryshad struggling with someone further in.

A scream of agony shocked us all to stillness but me and Sorgrad recovered first. As I slashed at the other man’s knees from behind, Sorgrad caught the enemy under the breastbone. The man died, vain pleading silenced by a gush of blood. Sorgrad tried to throw the body back off his blade. I stepped forward to help, holding the corpse down with one boot and saw Ryshad hacking at two men unaccountably tangled in choking coils of sodden cloth.

“Shiv got the laundry on our side,” grinned Sorgrad over the corpse between us.

Shiv was standing on the rim of the pool, a narrow column of scalding steam untroubled by the cold air from the open door and coiling down and around a man whose face was pale, pulpy and undeniably dead. I spoke without thinking. “You cooked him like a pudding.”

“Pretty much.” The mage sighed. “And I really am all but spent.”

Ryshad kicked the swathed bodies at his feet to make sure they were good and dead. Blood oozed from rents in the blankets and flowed across the floor to join water and lye seeping down the drain. “Let’s get out of here.”

He and Sorgrad were first out of the door, me following with an arm ready in case Shiv needed support. ’Gren was in the centre of the yard, proud and belligerent as a cockerel ready to leave all comers bleeding in the dust.

“Let me repay your hospitality,” he taunted the unseen inhabitants of the steading. “My mother throws better bread than your women make to the dogs!”

“We’re leaving,” Sorgrad warned him as we passed. ’Gren took a moment to piss copiously on the ground and then ran to catch up.

Ryshad fell back to let the two of them go on ahead. “Shiv?”

“I’ll be all right,” said the wizard tightly. “I just need some rest and to work out why my magic’s not reaching as it should.” He sounded quite as annoyed as weary.

“Rest may solve it. How often does a mage do half what you’ve done these past few days?” Still, I was starting to share his concern that something, somewhere must be very wrong if we couldn’t contact any other mage.

We passed the boundary wall, Ryshad checking all the while to be sure we weren’t pursued. “We’ll find somewhere to hide up and work out our next move,” he said decisively. “And we don’t want to be disturbed. Livak, can you work that aetheric charm against being tracked?”

I did my best to sing the jaunty tune as we ran, hoping the Artifice was proof against my ragged breath and the jolting of the uneven, stony ground.