“Could they be Lheanor’s men, watching over us?” he asked Taim.

“Unlikely, sire.” The warrior sniffed. “He’d not set such a watch on you without letting us know, would he?”

“Then I want to know who they are, and what they intend. Now, before we get back to the Tower.”

Taim beckoned Rothe without breaking his stride. The shieldman trotted up to join them.

“We’ll turn along the next side street,” Taim said quite casually. “You and Orisian press on down it, in clear sight. I’ll hang back. Give the hounds sniffing our heels a surprise.”

They took the next turning on their right. It was a narrow lane, though still busy. Some women and girls were hanging freshly dyed sheets out to dry. A pair of men were arguing over a cockerel that one of them held in his hands. Half a dozen children were throwing pebbles up onto a shingled roof, laughing at the rattle. Rothe led Orisian on at a slightly faster pace. Taim turned aside and Orisian lost sight of him.

“Best not to look back,” Rothe muttered. “Don’t want to give them any sign of what’s happening.”

“Can Taim manage two?”

“Oh, you needn’t worry about that. They’ll be sorry they woke up this morning.”

Only a moment or two later, a flurry of footfalls, shouts and dull impacts burst out behind them and both Orisian and Rothe spun around. Taim was kneeling on one man who lay face down in the roadway. The second was hobbling off as fast as what looked to be a thoroughly deadened leg would allow.

The cockerel had escaped its owner in the excitement, and ran chattering off down the lane. Both the men who had been arguing over it set off in pursuit. The little gang of children had dropped their pebbles and were pointing excitedly at Taim and his captive.

“Could only hold one, sire,” Taim said apologetically as Orisian and Rothe walked up to him.

“One’s enough,” Rothe said with feeling. “Let’s turn him over.”

They rolled the dazed man onto his back and Taim rested a swordpoint on his chest, pinning him to the cobbles. Rothe leaned down.

“Who are you, then?” he asked, and even to Orisian his voice sounded cold and threatening.

The prone man turned his face aside and maintained a stubborn silence. Taim tapped the man’s chest with his blade.

“Now is not the moment for bravery. We are none of us here renowned for our patience. You’ll come to no harm, if you but share your purpose with us.”

“I’d no purpose but to be walking with a friend,” the man spat a little indistinctly. He still seemed somewhat stunned, either by the unexpected course of events or by his fall to the ground. “We’d not thought to find bandits here. You’ve no right to set upon us.”

Rothe straightened. He and Taim glanced at one another and Orisian saw some kind of understanding pass between the two warriors. Taim sheathed his sword. He kicked the man, without any great force, in the ribs.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“I’ll not give my name to thieves.”

Orisian caught a certain texture in the man’s voice, an accent that was almost, but not quite, familiar.

“Stand up,” Taim said wearily. He looked to Orisian. “We may as well send him on his way, sire. He’ll tell us nothing beyond what he’s already done just by opening his mouth.”

Orisian nodded.

“Tell your master we don’t like to be followed,” Taim called after the man as he hurried, rather stiffly, away.

“Haig?” Orisian asked quietly.

Taim and Rothe both nodded.

“Nar Vay, I think,” Taim said. “Somewhere close to the border with Ayth. But Haig, yes.”

“Aewult, then. Or Mordyn Jerain.”

“Or the Steward,” Rothe suggested glumly. “Any one of them. All of them. It hardly matters which.”

“No,” agreed Orisian. “It doesn’t. How many men have you got here, Taim? Seven hundred?”

If the warrior was surprised at the question, he hid it well. “About that. A handful under, perhaps, that are truly fit to march. If marching is what’s in your thoughts, that is.”

“So long as we’re here, we’re guests,” Orisian said. “Beggars. Playthings for Haig. They mean to keep us here, rotting, while they settle affairs in the Glas valley. And what happens then? Aewult and the Shadowhand will make all our decisions for us if we let them.”

“They wouldn’t dare,” Rothe growled.

“They might,” Taim said.

“I just don’t want to fail those people, homeless on that street back there. Or Croesan,” Orisian sighed. Or my father, he could have added. Or Fariel, even. “Aewult might not be as clever as he thinks he is. He might not find it as easy as he expects to march all the way up to the Stone Vale. There are things…”

He left the thought unfinished. He had said nothing to anyone about what he and Anyara had witnessed in Yvane’s chamber. In truth, they had seen nothing. Only felt, and heard what Yvane told them. He did not doubt that Aeglyss was a danger; others might not be so willing to trust the words of na’kyrim. He shrugged.

“It feels… if we were in Kolglas, we’d be on our own ground, if nothing else. Nobody could tell us what to do then. Nobody would find it so easy to set their spies on us.”

“Aewult will be… upset, if we march without his approval,” Taim observed.

“Can you move quickly, or quietly, enough to ensure he’s got no chance of stopping you? That’s all that would matter. Once you’re on the road north, the way is clear.”

Taim smiled. “I should think so. Certainly, I should imagine, with a little help from Lheanor and his people.”

“I’ll talk to the Thane,” Orisian said. It eased him a little to make a choice, to set his feet on a path of his own choosing. Here in Kolkyre, he felt impotent and ringed about with uncertainty. Could it really be as easy as simply deciding to walk away from it?

“And another thing,” he said. “I want Anyara to have a shieldman.”

“A shieldman?” Taim echoed.

“The best man you have.”

“That’s… not usually done, sire.”

“If it was, I wouldn’t have to ask, would I? She’s faced more danger than I have since Winterbirth. And she’s all the family I have left. I want her to have a shieldman.”

Taim bowed his head a fraction. “I will find someone.”

Rothe took an almost sheepish step forwards, scratching absently at his beard in the way he always did when uncomfortable.

“You should have another shieldman of your own, Orisian,” he said. “Several, in fact. We’ve been remiss not to take care of it sooner. Now you’re Thane, and I’m broken-winged…”

“No,” said Orisian, too quickly perhaps. “No more.”

Rothe looked dismayed. Orisian touched him on his good arm.

“I don’t need anyone but you, Rothe. You’ve served me better than my father could ever have asked of you. I won’t have anyone else.. .”

He did not finish the thought. It might not be fitting, he imagined, for a Thane to show too much distaste for the sacrifice of others in his name. Already, on that torch-lit night of Winterbirth in Castle Kolglas, he had seen Kylane, his second shieldman, die in his defence: as hurtful a death, in some ways, as any there had been. Rothe had long ago made the promise to do likewise if needed, and Orisian would not shame him by trying to undo that, but he would permit no one else to shoulder the burden afresh.

He could see in Rothe’s softening, sad expression that he did not need to explain his reasons. The man had been with him long enough to know something of how his mind worked.

“It’s unwise,” Taim Narran said. “However worthy Rothe might be, he cannot guard you always. You are Thane, as he says. You must allow us to see to your protection as…”

“No,” Orisian insisted. He turned away. “Let’s get back.”

“It’s all right, Taim,” he heard Rothe saying with strained levity behind him. “These wounds are only grazes to the likes of me. I’ll have shaken them off in another few days, then you’ll see the Thane is still well-guarded.”