said.
‘They’re across. We’re not the only ones moving. Get back along the bank. Get
the squad in place. Get a message back to base.’ Erato moved back along the
alley, headed towards the river house.
It smelled of double-cross, the whole business. His partner jogged off, holding
his cloak tight to him, muffling his armour. They kept well away from the
grounds, wary of traps. This was the place to watch. Here. He was sure of that.
He settled in then, watching the storm clouds lose themselves on the seaward
horizon in the dark, down that split that divided Downwind from Sanctuary, poor
from rich, that division no bridge could span. He had been smug once, had Erato,
well-paid, well-armed as he was, convinced of his own skill, of the reputation
that would keep challenges off his neck. And somewhere in Downwind that bluff
was called, and they dared not go in, dared not pass the streets except by day
had effectively lost nighttime access to their own base beyond the Downwind, the
slaver’s old estate, and relied more and more on the city command. And their
enemies knew it.
It would be a long, cold wait. It eroded morale, that view of the bridge, the
river, the Downwind. The realization came to him that he was sitting now in the
same kind of position the bridge guard had been in, alone out here. Sounds came
and went in the streets, rustled in the thin line of brush that rimmed the
river-shore. Wild fears dawned on him, to wonder whether the others were there,
whether those sounds masked murder, creepings through cover, throats cut, or