Since he had forfeited his knife, Brogan drew his sword instead. "What did you call me, you filthy little whore?"

"Nothing." In the clutch of panic, she threw her head from side to side, her black curls whipping across her face. "Nothing!"

"My, my, lost your spine so easily?"

"What do you want?" she panted. "I'm no baneling! Leave me go! I'm no baneling!"

"Of course you be no baneling. You be too pompous to be a baneling, but that makes you no less despicable. Or useful."

"Then it's him you want? Yes, the duke. He's the baneling. Leave me go, and I'll recount his crimes."

Brogan spoke through clenched teeth. "The Creator does not be served by false, self-serving confessions. But you will serve him, nonetheless." His cheek twitched with a grim smile. "You will serve the Creator through me; you'll do my bidding."

"I'll do no such — " She cried out as Galtero tightened his grip. "Yes all right," she gasped. "Anything. Just don't hurt me. Tell me what you want, and I'll do it."

She tried unsuccessfully to back away as he put his face within inches of hers. "You will do as I tell you," he said dirough gritted teeth.

Her voice was choked with terror. "Yes. All right. You have my word."

He sneered derisively. "I wouldn't take the word of a whore like you: one who would sell anything, betray any principle. You will do my bidding because you have no choice."

He backed away, pinched her left nipple between his thumb and the knuckle of his first finger, and stretched it out. As she wailed, her eyes opened wide. Brogan brought the sword up and, with a sawing cut, sliced off the nipple. Her scream drowned out the howl of the wind.

Brogan placed the severed nipple in Lunetta's upturned palm. Her stubby fingers closed around it as her eyes closed in a shroud of magic. Soft sounds of an ancient incantation melded with the wind and the sound of the duchess's shivering shrieks. Galtero held her weight as the wind wheeled around them.

Lunetta's chanting rose in pitch as she tilted her head up to the inky sky. With her eyes shut tight, she summoned the spell around herself and the woman before her. The wind seemed to pull the words forth as Lunetta conjured in her streganicha tongue.

"From earth to sky: from leaves to roots. from fire to ice, and soul's own fruits.

From light to dark, from wind to water, I claim this spirit and Creator's daughter.

Till the heart's blood boils or the bones be ash, till the tallow be dust and death's teeth gnash, this one be mine.

I cast her gnomon into a sunless glen, and pull this soul beyond its umbras' ken.

Till her tasks be done and the worms be fed, till the flesh be dust and the soul has fled, this one be mine.

Lunette's voice lowered to a throaty chant. "Cock's hen, spiders ten, bezoar then, I make a thrall stew. Ox gall, castor and caul, I make a chattel brew…"

Her words drifted away and were lost in the wind, but her squat body bobbed as she went on, shaking her empty hand over the woman's head, and the other, with the chunk of flesh, over her own heart.

The duchess shuddered as tendrils of magic coiled around her, snaking into her flesh. She convulsed as its fangs sank into her very soul.

Galtero had all he could do to hold her, until at last, she went limp in his grip. Despite the wind, there seemed a sudden silence.

Lunetta opened her hand. "She be mine to bid. I pass my right to you." She placed the now desiccated knob of flesh in Brogan's upturned palm. "She be yours, now, my lord general."

Brogan closed the shriveled knot in his fist. The duchess hung glassy-eyed by her arms behind her back. Her legs held her weight, but she shook with pain and cold. Blood oozed from her wound.

Brogan tightened his fist. "Stop that shivering!"

She looked into his eyes, and her glazed expression faded. She became still. "Yes, my lord general."

Brogan gestured to his sister. "Heal her."

Galtero watched with a glint of lust in his dark eyes as Lunetta cupped both hands around the woman's injured breast. Duke Lumholtz, too, watched with eyes nearly bulging out of their sockets. Lunetta's eyes closed again as she wove more magic, casting a soft spell. Blood trickled from between Lunetta's fingers until the woman's flesh began drawing together in the healing.

Brogan's mind drifted as he waited. The Creator did indeed watch over his own. A day that had started with him at the brink of the greatest of triumphs was brought nearly to ruin, but in the end he had proven that those who kept the Creator's cause in their hearts could prevail. Lord Rahl was going to find out just what happened to those who worshiped the Keeper, and the Imperial Order was going to find out just how valuable the lord general of the Blood of the Fold was to them. Galtero, too, had proven his worth this day; the man was entitled to a trifle for his efforts.

Lunetta used the duchess's wrap to wipe off the blood, and then withdrew to reveal a perfectly whole breast, as flawless as the other, except it had no nipple. Brogan had that, now.

Lunetta motioned toward the duke. "Am I to do him, too, Lord General? Do you wish to have them both?"

"No." Brogan lifted a hand with a dismissive wave. "No, I only need her. But he will play his part in my plan."

Brogan fixed his glare on the duke's panicked eyes. "This be a dangerous city. As Lord Rahl told us today, there be dangerous creatures about, attacking innocent citizens who have no chance against them. Shocking. If only Lord Rahl were here to protect the duke from such an attack."

"I will to see to it at once, Lord General," Galtero said.

"No, I can take care of this. I thought you might like to 'entertain1 the duchess here, while I see to the duke."

Galtero drew teeth across his lower lip as he gazed at the duchess. "Yes, Lord General, very much. Thank you." He tossed Brogan his knife. "You will need this. The soldiers told me that the creatures disemboweled their victims with a three-bladed knife. You will need to make three slices to duplicate the effect."

Brogan thanked his colonel. He could always count on Galtero's thoroughness. The woman's eyes moved back and forth between the three of them, but she said nothing.

"Would you like me to compel her to cooperate?"

A gruesome grin spread on Galtero's usually stony face. "And what would be the purpose of that, Lord General? Better if she learned another lesson this night."

Brogan nodded. "As you wish, then." He looked to the duchess. "My dear, I do not bid this of you. You are free to express your own true feelings about it to Galtero here."

She cried out when Galtero swept an arm around her waist. "Why don't we go over there, in the darkness, I would not want to offend your delicate sensibilities, Duchess, by allowing you to see what be happening to your husband."

"You can't!" she cried out. "I'll freeze in the snow! I must do my lord general's bidding. I'll freeze!"

Galtero patted her bottom. "Oh, you won't freeze. The midden will be warm under you."

She shrieked and tried to pull away, but Galtero already had a good grip on her. He tightened his other fist in her hair.

"She be a lovely creature, Galtero; see that that beauty isn't marred. And don't be long; she yet has bidding to do for me. She will have to wear less paint," he said with a smirk, "but since she has such talent with it, at least she can paint herself a nipple where her real one be missing.

"When I be finished with the duke here, and you be finished with her, then Lunetta has another spell to cast over her. A very special spell. A very rare and powerful spell."

Lunetta stroked her pretties as she watched his eyes. She knew what he wanted. "Then I will need something of his, something he has touched."

Brogan patted his pocket. "He accommodated us with a coin."