I WAS SOMEWHAT DISGRUNTLED AFTER my conversation with Dryleaf, but there was little I could do about it. Mag and I slept well that night, happy to have a mattress beneath us instead of a bedroll on the hard ground. The next morning, we broke our fast quickly and then returned to our room to discuss what we should do.

“I think it is clear what danger threatens the town,” she said. “The people here are frightened of the Shades. They must be terrorizing the countryside.”

“But then why would Yue let us in?” I asked.

“Mayhap they know the Shades, or know what they look like,” said Mag. “You and I are no friends of theirs, certainly. Mayhap Yue knew it when she permitted us to enter.”

I shook my head. “That seems quite a guess.”

She spread her hands. “Do you have a better one?”

“No,” I admitted.

“Then let us carry on as if I am right until proven otherwise, unless you would rather sit in this inn and wait for the weremage to come to us. Any plan of action, carried out with certainty, is better than no plan at all.”

I had to laugh at that. “Do not throw Victon’s words at me after all these years.”

“You obeyed him easily enough when we fought for him,” she said with a grin.

“And that has not been for many long years.”

Despite my protests, I knew she was right. We had no better ideas, and even if a thorough search did not reveal the Shades themselves, it might lead us to another answer. Still, I was nervous we might draw attention to ourselves. Constable Yue had made it clear that we were not to cause trouble in her town, and we were planning to do exactly that.

For caution’s sake, we set out into the streets with our cloaks on and our hoods up, despite the heat of the day. Soon we were both drenched with sweat. I did my best to ignore it, but Mag complained mightily. We worked our way through shops, ostensibly to pick up supplies so that we could continue on our journey.

“If the Shades are indeed terrorizing this town, the people will know where they are,” said Mag. “Keep an eye out for places that the townsfolk avoid—even if they only avoid looking at them.”

We did so, but we soon realized we had a problem. The town was much the same as it had been yesterday; the people were afraid and despondent no matter where we went. It was hard to find a place they were avoiding when they seemed to be avoiding going outside at all. Few townsfolk would look at us, and in every shop we visited, the owner would conduct business as quickly as possible without speaking. When we tried to make conversation, they gave short, clipped answers or simply asked us to leave. And most curiously, when we told them we were looking for supplies to leave Lan Shui and continue our journey, they looked at us with terror in their eyes.

Probably out of frustration, Mag’s course became increasingly erratic, crossing back and forth through the town on a dizzying path with no pattern that I could discern. At last, just past midday, she stopped in the middle of the street and balled her hands into fists.

“Let us get ourselves a meal and something to drink.”

“That would be a welcome relief,” I said. By now my shirt was clinging to me with sweat.

“Mm-hm,” said Mag with a nod.

Something in her manner was strange, and I grew alert at once. She seemed distracted.

“Mag?” I said in a low voice. “What is it?”

“Mayhap nothing,” she said. “I might say more when we find a place out of the sun.”

Though I was intensely curious, I followed her without further questions. She stepped into the first tavern she found and paid for a light meal of bread and cheese and ale. Leading me to a corner table, she sat facing the door with her back against the wall. I sat beside her, facing out into the rest of the room.

“Well?” I said.

“I thought I saw someone following us,” she told me. “They were being careful not to be seen, but stealth did not seem to be their strong suit. There! Look at me and pretend we are talking.”

We turned our heads towards each other. “We are talking,” I pointed out.

“Yes, good,” said Mag. “Just like that, as though we are really having a conversation.”

I laughed at the joke, but also to help the ruse. The laugh gave me an excuse to turn my head back towards the rest of the room, and I saw the person Mag must have been talking about. He was a young man with bulging eyes and short black hair, his light brown cloak thrown back over his shoulders in the heat. As soon as he had entered the room, he had gone straight to the proprietor, and was speaking with him now. Their words were inaudible from where we sat.

“The boy?” I said, turning back to Mag.

“Yes,” she said. “I kept seeing him on whichever street we were on, no matter how wildly I turned our path.”

“So that is why you took such a strange route through the streets,” I said. “I was wondering about that.”

“He is leaving,” said Mag, glancing out of the corner of her eye.

“We should go after him.”

“Do you think so?” said Mag with a smirk. “Be careful, though. Capturing him will be useless, and of course we cannot kill him. He looks young. I think he will be easily frightened. Let us spring an attack that fails. He might lead us straight back to his masters.”

“Unless he is the weremage in disguise,” I said.

Mag sighed and shook her head. “Albern, you know I love you, like one loves a helpless pet, but you can be intolerably foolish. We know the weremage can take a bird’s form. If she knew we were here, and if she were following us, she would watch us from the sky.”

She stood and made for the tavern’s front door without waiting for my answer. I lifted one finger and opened my mouth to call out a retort, but could think of nothing. Lowering my hand, I stood to follow her, grumbling many ominous things about pets and helpless and what I would show her about intolerable foolishness. I was careful Mag heard none of my words, of course.

We left the tavern and headed down the street, back the way we had come. As we did, a figure detached itself from a nearby wall and followed us, trying to stick to the sparse shadows cast by buildings. Mag had been right about one thing: the boy was about as stealthy as a troll with an arrow in each eye and a spear in its backside.

“Now,” whispered Mag, and ducked suddenly down an alley.

I dashed after her. We ran to the end of the alley and split up on the other side, each of us hiding behind a corner and waiting for the boy to follow. We heard his hurried footsteps drawing nearer. Mag gripped her spear and nodded to me from across the alley mouth.

The boy cried out in terror as we leaped upon him. Mag brought the butt of her spear around and struck him in the ribs with it. It was a light tap, but he squealed like a shot squirrel. I had already drawn back my fist to swing at him, but when he doubled over, my fist sailed over his head and into Mag’s jaw. She stumbled back, apparently stunned for a moment, and then attacked again. But she seemed to overestimate the swing of her spear this time, and the butt crashed into my shoulder instead of the boy’s face. I fell against the building beside me, grunting in pain.

The boy, who had all the wit of a bit of over-cured leather, stared at us in confusion. I growled at Mag through gritted teeth.

“Stop just standing there, or he will get away.”

As though the idea had never occurred to him before, the boy screamed and ran back through the alley the way he had come. Mag seized my shoulder and pulled me after her.

“You swung a bit harder than you needed to,” Mag remarked.

“My deepest apologies. I am only a helpless pet, and cannot always control my own strength.”

Mag snorted and redoubled her pace, for the boy had vanished around the side of the buildings up ahead. Mag and I followed him just as he had been following us, but with one important difference: we knew what we were doing. We hung back at each corner, only peeking around to make sure we saw which way the boy had gone.

It seemed to me, however, that we hardly needed to take such precautions. The boy did not glance back even once, and he did not seem to complicate his route at all, but led us straight to the heart of Lan Shui. At last he threw open the door of a ramshackle house and then slammed it shut behind him. Mag and I skidded to a halt just outside the door, looking up at the building.

“Is there any reason not to follow him straightaway?” said Mag.

“This is a large building that could contain a dozen enemies or more,” I said.

“Any good reason, I mean?”

I drew my sword. “None.”

Mag grinned as she hefted her spear. Together we launched ourselves forwards, slamming our shoulders into the front door.

It burst open, and I took in the room at a blink. Just before us stood the boy, his eyes bulging more than ever with terror at the sight of us. He stood with two others, a thin Heddish man and a fat Dorsean woman—Shades, I guessed, though they did not wear blue and grey. A fourth Shade stood in a doorway at the other end of the room. She was older, but hale, and wore her grey hair in a braid.

“Well met,” I said. “Did we meet in Northwood? I have such a terrible memory for faces.”

“Pantu, you fool,” hissed the woman with the grey braid. Then, to the others, she cried, “Kill them!” But she did not heed her own advice, instead turning and fleeing deeper into the house.

The thin man shoved the boy out of the way and rushed us, unsheathing a sword. The woman picked up a warhammer before doing the same. I braced myself to receive the man’s first lunge, but that turned out to be unnecessary. Mag gave a savage thrust, and his sword arm was dangling useless at his side, while his blade clattered to the floor. The fat woman swung her warhammer twice, driving us both back one step, but then Mag pounced. Her spearhead pierced the woman’s gut, making her gasp, before withdrawing and striking again, this time straight into her heart.

I almost relaxed, before I saw the thin man trying to retrieve his sword with his left hand. My own sword came sweeping down, and the Shade fell to the floor.

The boy cowered in the corner of the room, his hands raised helplessly before him, terrified. Mag advanced on him, but I darted forwards and took her arm. She whirled on me, and I flinched before her dead-eyed gaze.

“Mag,” I said. “Look at him.”

She hesitated and looked down at the boy. He looked back up at us, terrified. I felt the tension bleed from Mag’s arm.

“Run for your life,” I told the boy. “And if you know what is good for you, stop working with these Shades. They will come to ruin in the end.”

I tossed my head, and the boy bolted through the open front door.

“There will be more of them,” said Mag, her voice the emotionless monotone of her battle-trance. “Let us clear the house, and carefully.”

She started for the door to the left, but I took her arm and stopped her. When she turned on me, I tried not to flinch at her dead eyes.

“Wait,” I said. I pointed to the room’s second door on the right. “If we chase the woman, she might be able to circle through the house and come out this way. One of us should stay here to guard the exit.”

“There could be a back door, too,” she said tonelessly. 

“There could be, but we know about the front door,” I said. “Go after her before we waste too much time.”

She nodded and darted through the left-hand door. I felt a twinge of shame at how easily I had let her go off on her own. But both of us knew that, if one of us should go alone into the house, it should be her. I could be overwhelmed if more foes waited within. Mag could not.

I took a stance by the front door, sword ready in my hand. After the first few moments, the house was silent; not even Mag’s footfalls could be heard. My pulse thudded loud in my ears, but it was thick and muddy. I shook my head, trying to clear it.

What was wrong with this place? The air was heavy with more than the midday heat. I could feel an evil energy seeping from the very walls. I had heard wizards talk of sensing magic at work. This felt like what they described, but of course I was no wizard. Even if there was magic here, I would never have been able to sense it. Yet I could sense … something.

Footsteps came pounding from behind the left-hand door. I tensed, raising my sword—and then I realized that it had to be Mag. No foe could have gotten past her to flee here.

The door opened to reveal the Shade woman with the grey braid.

She skidded to a halt at the sight of me, her well-lined eyes going wide. She, too, held a blade in her hand, but it dipped for a moment as she dragged a hand down her face.

“This was not supposed to happen,” she muttered, almost as if talking to herself. “You were never supposed to come here.”

I shifted my stance slightly, watching for a trick. “I am sorry to be such a disappointment, though you may be relieved to know I have always been such, according to those who know me best.”

She spat on the wooden floor. “Shut your prattling lips. You were not meant to die here, but dark take me if I will let you kill me instead.”

“Now, be calm,” I said. “There is no reason anyone has to—”

She lunged before I could finish, and I barely blocked her overhead swing. But hardly had her blade rebounded before it came again, swinging from my left this time. I tried to twist out of the way, but I felt the tip of the blade slice a deep cut in my forearm. I grimaced in pain and tried to step away, but she followed.

“You people do not poison your weapons, do you?” I said, trying to keep my tone light.

“Do you think servants of the Lord have no honor?” she said. Then she smiled. “You will have to find out, I suppose.”

She attacked again. I warded her blows, but each one forced me another step back. I could not risk a glance behind me, but I could feel the closed door at my back. The woman saw it, and she gave a grim smile. She was a better fighter than I was, and we both knew it. I took a wild swing that forced her a half-step back. But even as my sword came around, I could feel myself losing my balance. I stumbled, and she saw her opening.

“Die, wretch,” she hissed, swinging for my side.

The only thing I could do was fall to the floor. My sword clattered out of reach. Her blade hissed harmlessly through the air where I had stood a moment before. But I had only prolonged the inevitable. I rolled desperately onto my back, hoping against hope that I could roll out of the way of her next swing.

But the woman was not standing over me with her blade held high. In fact, she was only standing at all because Mag’s spear had pierced straight through her head and embedded itself in the wall. Now the woman hung feebly from the middle of the spear, bouncing up and down slightly with its spring. Her eyes were cold and empty.

I looked over. Mag stood in the right-hand doorway, blood spattered all across her clothing. She had arrived just in time to throw her spear across the room and through the head of my foe. Even as I watched, her battle-trance slipped away and warmth came back into her expression.

“Five, Albern,” she said. “I took five of them, and still I had to help you against one.”

“In a building like this, yes,” I said. “Put me on an open field and put a bow in my hand—”

“—and stand your enemies in a line facing you like practice dummies, and do not give them any weapons to fight back, yes, yes,” said Mag. She came to me and held out a hand to pull me up, forcing a slight smile. “We cannot always fight in perfect circumstances, you oaf.”

“Oh, be silent,” I grumbled. “And would you take back your spear? That is unnerving.” I pointed at the grey-haired woman, still suspended where she stood by Mag’s weapon.

Mag’s little smile died, and she went about the messy business of retrieving her spear. Once she had extricated it from the woman and the door, she cleaned it on the woman’s cloak. I went to where my sword had fallen and picked it up, keeping a suspicious eye on both doors leading out of the room. I did not want to be taken by surprise again.

Mag noticed my attitude and shook her head. “I got them all. The house feels empty.”

“But still evil,” I remarked. The air was still thick with the curious power I had felt earlier.

“Yes, still evil,” said Mag.

“How did the woman get past you?” I said. “She emerged from the left-hand door—the same one you went through. Did she slip by somehow?”

Mag turned to look at the door, frowning. “She did not. I circled the whole house and came back around the other way, and I did not see her until I killed her. But I passed a staircase leading up. The woman must have run upstairs, and then come back down after I had passed. She, and three others—they found me in the back room, surprising me by attacking from behind.”

My eyebrows shot for the ceiling. “However did you survive.”

Mag put a hand over her heart. “It was a near thing.”

I could not find it in me to laugh. A mercenary learns to lighten their mood, even in the midst of the grim business of killing, but I was never able to laugh in the presence of an enemy’s corpse.

“I wish now that I had not killed all of them,” said Mag. “I did not think to let any of them live, for I thought we could interrogate this one.” She pointed at the corpse of the grey-braided woman.

“Interrogate …” I closed my eyes and sighed. The weremage. She was not here. In the fighting, I had almost forgotten about her. “Sky. I had not thought of that.”

“Clearly not,” said Mag. “In any case, we did not find what we sought, and I feel it would be unwise for us to remain here overlong. Let us be on our way.”

“A sensible suggestion,” I said.

I turned to the front door and threw it open, relieved, at least, that I would be able to escape the oppressive feeling that permeated the house. The open air outside felt like cool springwater on a midsummer day. I stopped just past the threshold and took several deep breaths. Mag was not so dramatic about it, but I could see the relief on her face as well. She planted the butt of her spear on the ground and leaned on it with a sigh.

“You!”

The voice—new, but still familiar—froze my blood. I looked up, the sinking feeling in my stomach growing worse, to see Yue marching towards us, her face red beneath her shock of bristling yellow hair.

“Dark take the both of you—you are under arrest, under the authority of the King’s law.”