murder, his father had dismembered her body, throwing the head and organs into
the palace sewer-stream and the rest into the garrison stewpot.
Sanctuary boasted no criers to shout out the hours of the night. When there was
a moon its progress gave approximate time, but in its absence night was an
eternity, and midnight that moment when your joints grew stiff from sitting on
the damp stone pilings of the Wideway and dark memories threatened the periphery
of your vision. Walegrin bought a torch from the cadaverous watchman at the
charnel house and entered the quiet bazaar.
Illyra emerged from the blacksmith’s stall the second time Walegrin used the
mountain hawk cry. She had concealed herself in a dark cloak which she held
tightly around herself. Her movements betrayed her fears. Walegrin led the way
in hurried silence. He took her arm at the elbow when they came into sight of
the barracks. She hesitated, then continued without his urging.
Walegrin’s men were nowhere to be seen in the common room that separated the
men’s and officers’ quarters. Illyra paced the room like a caged animal,
remembering.
‘You’ll need a table, candles, and what else?’ he asked, eager to be on with the
night’s activity and suddenly mindful that he had brought her back to this
place.
‘It’s so much smaller than I remember it,’ she said, then added, ‘just the table
and candles, I’ve brought the rest myself.’
Walegrin pulled a table closer to the hearth. While he gathered up candles she
unfastened her cloak and placed it over the table. She wore sombre woollens