The Chaoswar Saga: A Kingdom Besieged, A Crown Imperilled, Magician’s End. Raymond E. Feist

to the top of a rise or turn in the road to ensure she didn’t lose them.

      Then came that irritating itch which meant she was being summoned to a meeting of the Conclave. She weighed her choice of actions and decided that her duty lay first in finding the reason for all the troublesome things she had witnessed. She was loath to quit when she was so close to uncovering the truth. So she had turned off the little orb, placed it in her boot and returned her attention to the wagons ahead. She was catching up with them when her ambusher had surprised her with an arrow that had sped past her head, missing her face by less than an inch.

      The man on the ground began to stir. Sandreena got up from the rock. When the man’s eyes opened, he found Sandreena’s sword point at his throat.

      ‘Oi,’ he said as his eyes focused on the lethal blade. ‘Let’s have none of that now, sister.’ He was speaking the local Keshian dialect, Lower Delkian.

      She tilted her head slightly as she stepped back and said, ‘Slowly.’

      He got gingerly to his feet, obviously still dazed. ‘Can’t say as I expected you to charge,’ he said. He grinned and said, ‘Right near did me in.’

      ‘Bodie,’ she said.

      His eyebrows rose and he switched to the King’s Tongue. ‘Good ear.’ To her it sounded like ‘Gud ar’. ‘Not too many in these parts would catch the accent.’

      ‘Hard not to miss that mangling of the King’s Tongue, or any other language apparently.’

      He leaned forward, hands on his knees. ‘Bit wobbly, still,’ he said. ‘You clopped me a good one to the side of me head.’

      ‘You’re fortunate that’s all you got. I’m usually less forgiving with people trying to kill me.’

      ‘Kill you?’ he said and laughed, then winced at the pain that brought him ‘Sister, if I’d wanted to kill you, you’d have not seen the arrow in your throat. I’m hardly modest when it comes to my bow skills. I’ve not met my better with one.’

      ‘Hardly modest, indeed.’ She looked at him. Slender, about her age, perhaps, dark hair that was little more than a shaggy thatch, a few days’ growth of beard and clothes that were not quite filthy. Glancing at the bow on the ground, she saw that it was perfectly maintained. ‘If you weren’t trying to kill me, what were you doing?’

      ‘Trying to slow you down a bit, that’s all. Man up in Darmin,’ which was the town where she had begun following the wagons, ‘paid me some coin to follow some wagons for an hour, then slow down anyone who might be following. Didn’t say a thing about killing, else I’d have asked for a lot more.’ He glanced at the angle of the sun and said, ‘Looks like I was gone an hour or so.’

      ‘About that.’

      ‘Well,’ he said with a broad smile, ‘seems like I’ve stalled you long enough, sister, so I’ll be on my way now.’

      ‘Wait a minute,’ said Sandreena. To emphasize the point, she extended her sword blade, making a barrier between them.

      ‘Yes?’

      ‘You expect me to let you walk away?’

      ‘Can’t see why not, sister. Spent an arrow to get your attention, and took a fair beating in exchange; seems a fair bargain, all things considered.’

      ‘I’ll be the judge of that.’

      The man lost his smile. ‘Look, you’ve had your bit of fun. Unless you’re breaking vows, I know you Dala lot don’t shed blood at whim. So, unless you see me beating up some little boys and take their side, I think we’re done here.’

      He took a step forward and found the flat of Sandreena’s blade hard against his chest.

      His smile returned. ‘Then again, maybe we’re not. What can I do for you?’

      ‘Start with a name.’

      ‘Ned. From Bodie, as you sussed.’

      ‘You’re a very long way from home.’

      ‘It’s a fact,’ he admitted, glancing around. He moved towards the rock where Sandreena had waited for him to regain consciousness and sat down. ‘Travel a bit here and there. I’m a hired bow, as you can tell, and I heard there was a fair bit of work down here, so I came.’

      ‘What did you hear?’

      ‘Stuff and nonsense from what I can tell,’ said the mercenary. ‘I did some work up in the Vale of Dreams, but that’s too much like bloody warfare, if you get my meaning. I’d rather take on less frantic work: caravan guard, watchman at a tavern, something where mostly I just need to be a bigger bully than the bully I’m tossing out, don’t you see?’

      ‘Thug for hire.’

      ‘Something like that.’ He gave a noncommittal shrug. ‘So, what’s it going to be?’

      ‘Who hired you to slow me down? And were they clear no killing was involved?’

      ‘Well, truth to tell,’ began Ned and then Sandreena pressed her sword hard against his chest. ‘Well, I took it to mean it was up to me as to what I was doing, don’t you see? I mean, a bag of coppers is fair enough wages for a little show-and-tell on the highway—’ She smacked him with the blade.

      ‘Ow!’ he said a little too theatrically. She knew he might have a little bruise but his buff coat and gambeson quilt blunted the impact. ‘Well, he may have thought he was entitled to a bit more than he got.’ He shrugged. ‘Can’t see if it matters, one way or the other. I mean, he said “slow her down” so that’s what I did. You’ve wasted a good hour or more here, right?’

      ‘Right,’ she agreed. She stepped forward and with her left foot struck him hard enough in his bruised ribs to send him backwards off the rock. A loud grunt of pain and a choked-off sob, then a long, ragged intake of breath told her she had caused him some serious pain. ‘Now, again, who paid you?’

      On hands and knees, head down, he looked as if he might pass out. Quietly he croaked out, ‘Honestly, sister, I don’t know. A bloke. Just a bloke. He bought me a drink, chatted me up, asked my trade, then offered me a job. That’s all. Look,’ he added, pulling a small purse from under his belt, ‘count it. It’s fifty coppers. A miserable half silver, and for what? Getting my ribs stave in?’

      She kicked him again and he collapsed with a groan and curled his knees to his chest.

      ‘Who hired you?’

      ‘I swear by any god you wish to name,’ he almost whispered through the pain, ‘I don’t know. He never said his name and I didn’t ask.’

      Sandreena had an instinct about these things. Kneeling, she grabbed him by the hair and yanked his head up. Putting her sword against his throat, she said, ‘One last time. His name?’ She pushed a little and the edge of the blade dug into Ned’s throat, painfully she was certain.

      ‘Nazir,’ Ned whispered. ‘He never told me his name, that’s the gods’ truth, but I overheard one of his men call him Nazir.’

      ‘Men? How many?’

      ‘Three. There were others,’ he said as she released his hair and stood up. ‘Maybe another two or three outside the inn. When they left it sounded like a large band of men. I didn’t follow because I was to wait for you. He gave me a good enough description; not that I needed it. No one ever sees a Knight-Adamant of any Order down here.’ He tried to smile but it was obvious his face hurt where she had struck him. ‘Certainly not a beauty like you, sister.’

      ‘Horse?’

      He hiked his thumb over his shoulder.

      ‘Good. Get it and don’t make me chase you.’

      ‘Wouldn’t think of it.’ He got to his feet slowly, wincing as he walked. It was clear the beating she had just administered had