LITMIR.BIZ

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to follow him, and turned the corner. He dodged to one side, but no expected ambush remained. The last time they had fought the Nighthawks, Arutha’s raiders had found the assassins determined to die rather than be captured. This time they seemed more determined to flee.

      Jimmy ran down the corridor, a half-dozen soldiers at his heels. He pushed open a side door and found three dead Nighthawks on the floor of a room behind the first they had entered. Already soldiers prepared torches. Arutha’s orders had been specific. All the dead were to have their hearts cut from their bodies and burned. No Black Slayers would rise from the grave this night to kill for Murmandamus.

      Jimmy shouted, ‘Did anyone run by here?’

      One soldier looked up. ‘Didn’t see anyone, squire, but we were busy up to a moment ago.’

      Jimmy nodded once and ran down the hall. Rounding a corner, he discovered a hand-to-hand struggle under way in a connecting corridor. He dodged between guardsmen who were quickly overwhelming the assassins and ran toward another door. It was not entirely closed, as if someone had slammed it behind him but not stopped to see if it was shut. Jimmy shoved it wide and stepped into a broad alley. And across from him were three open and unguarded doors. Jimmy felt his heart sink. He turned to discover Arutha and Gardan behind him. Arutha cursed in frustration. What had once been a large burnt-out building had been replaced by several smaller ones, and where a solid wall had been, now doors invited passage. And not one of Arutha’s soldiers had arrived in time to prevent anyone from fleeing by this route. ‘Did anyone escape this way?’ asked the Prince.

      ‘I don’t know,’ answered Jimmy. ‘One, I think, through one of these doors.’

      A guard turned to Gardan and asked, ‘Shall we pursue, Marshal?’

      Arutha turned back into the house as shouts of inquiry came from nearby buildings, from citizens of Fish Town awakened by the fighting. ‘Don’t bother,’ said the Prince flatly. ‘As certain as the sunrise, there are doors to other streets in those homes. We’ve failed this night.’

      Gardan shook his head. ‘If anyone was already here, they might have bolted as soon as they heard us attack.’

      Other guards came up the narrow alley, many with bloodied clothing. One ran to the Prince. ‘We think two escaped down a side street, Highness.’

      Arutha pushed past the man and re-entered the building. Reaching the main room, he found Valdis overseeing the guards as they conducted the grisly work of ensuring no undead assassins rose again. Grimly the men cut deeply into the chest of each dead man and removed his heart. The hearts were burned at once.

      A breathless sailor appeared and said, ‘Your Highness, Captain Hull says you should come quick.’

      Arutha, Jimmy, and Gardan left the room, as Roald and Laurie came into view, weapons still in hand. Arutha regarded his blood-spattered brother-in-law and said, ‘What are you doing here?’

      ‘I just came along to keep an eye on things,’ he answered. Roald looked sheepishly at the Prince as Laurie added, ‘He could never learn to lie with a straight face. As soon as he asked me to go gambling, I knew something was up.’

      Arutha waved away further comment and followed the sailor to the room leading to the sewer, and down the ladder, the others coming after him. They moved down a tunnel to where Hull and his men waited in their boats. Hull motioned for Arutha to board, and he and Gardan entered one boat, Jimmy, Roald, and Laurie another.

      They were rowed to a large convergence of six channels. A boat was tethered to a mooring ring in the stone, and from a trap in the ceiling above hung a rope ladder. ‘We stopped three boats of them coming out, but this one got past. When we reached here, they had all escaped.’

      ‘How many?’ asked the Prince.

      ‘Maybe half a dozen,’ answered Hull.

      Arutha swore again. ‘We lost maybe two or three down a side street and now we know this lot got away. We may have as many as a dozen Nighthawks loose in the city.’

      He paused a moment, then looked at Gardan, his eyes narrowing in controlled anger as he said, ‘Krondor is now under martial law. Seal the city.’

      For the second time in four years, Krondor endured martial law. When Anita had escaped from her captivity in her father’s palace and Jocko Radburn, Guy du Bas-Tyra’s captain of secret police, had sought her out, the city had been sealed. Now the Princess’s husband searched out the city for possible assassins. The reasons might be different, but the effects on the populace were the same. And coming on the heels of celebration, martial law was a doubly bitter draught for the people to swallow.

      Within hours of the order for martial law being given, the merchants began to troop to the palace to lodge their complaints. First came the ship brokers, whose commerce was the first disrupted as their vessels were held in port or denied entrance to the harbour. Trevor Hull led the squadron assigned to blockade duty, since the former smuggler knew every trick used to run a blockade. Twice ships attempted to leave and both times they were intercepted and boarded, their captains were arrested and their crews confined to ship. In both cases it was quickly determined that the motive had been profit and not escape from Arutha’s retribution. Still, since it was not known who they were searching for, any man arrested was kept in the city jail, the palace dungeon, or the prison barracks.

      Soon the ship brokers were followed by the freight haulers; then the millers, when farmers were kept out of the city; then others, each with a reasonable request to have the quarantine of the city lifted for just his special case. All were denied.

      Kingdom law was based upon the concept of the Great Freedom, the common law. Each man freely accepted service to his master, except the occasional criminal condemned to slavery or bondsman serving his indenture. Nobles received the benefits of rank in exchange for protecting those under their rule, and the network of vassalage rose from common farmer paying rent to his squire or baron, who paid taxes to his earl. In turn, the earl served his duke, who answered to the crown. But when the rights of free men were abused, those free men were quick to voice their displeasure. There were too many enemies within and without the boundaries of the Kingdom for an abusive noble to keep his position overly long. Raiding pirates from the Sunset Islands, Quegan privateers, goblin bands, and, always, the Brotherhood of the Dark Path – the dark elves – demanded some internal stability in the Kingdom. Only once in its history had the populace borne oppression without open protest, under the rule of mad King Rodric, Lyam’s predecessor, for the ultimate recourse to grievance was the crown. Under Rodric, lese majesty had been reinstated as a capital crime and men could not express their grievances publicly. Lyam had again struck that offence from the laws of the land; as long as treason was not espoused, men were free to speak their minds. And the free men of Krondor spoke their displeasure loudly.

      Krondor became a city in turmoil, her stability a thing of the past. For the first few days of martial law, there had been grumbling, but as the seal on the city entered its second week, shortages became commonplace. Prices rose as demand exceeded supply. When the first alehouse near the docks ran out of ale, a full scale riot ensued. Arutha ordered curfew.

      Armed squads of the Royal Household Guard patrolled the streets alongside the normal city watch. Agents of both the Chancellor and the Upright Man eavesdropped on conversations, listening for hints to where the assassins lay.

      And free men protested.

      Jimmy hurried down the hall toward the Prince’s private chambers. He had been sent to carry messages to the commander of the city watch and was returning with the commander at his side. Arutha had become a man driven by his need to find the hidden assassins. He had put aside all other matters. The daily business of the Principality had slowed, then had finally come to a halt, while Arutha searched for the Nighthawks.

      Jimmy knocked upon the door to the Prince’s chamber; he and the commander of the watch were admitted. Jimmy went to stand next to Laurie and Duchess Carline while the commander came to attention before the Prince. Gardan, Captain Valdis, and Earl Volney were arrayed behind the Prince’s chair. Arutha looked up at the commander. ‘Commander Bayne? I sent

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