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Back A Burning Sea
Chapters (54)
  1. CAST OF CHARACTERS
  2. PART ONE
  3. CHAPTER ONE
  4. CHAPTER TWO
  5. CHAPTER THREE
  6. CHAPTER FOUR
  7. CHAPTER FIVE
  8. CHAPTER SIX
  9. CHAPTER SEVEN
  10. CHAPTER EIGHT
  11. CHAPTER NINE
  12. CHAPTER TEN
  13. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  14. CHAPTER TWELVE
  15. PART TWO
  16. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  17. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  18. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  19. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  20. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  21. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  22. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  23. CHAPTER TWENTY
  24. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  25. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  30. PART THREE
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  34. CHAPTER THIRTY
  35. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  42. PART FOUR
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  45. CHAPTER FORTY
  46. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  47. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  48. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  49. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  50. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
  51. CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
  52. CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
  53. HISTORICAL NOTE
  54. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Arbasdos glared down at the blade in his hand and for a long moment his brow furrowed. ‘Very good,’ he murmured at length. ‘At noon then. See that the slaves are assembled.’

Erlan was dragged blinking into the sunlight – with one eye, anyway. The other was sealed shut with the swelling.

His escape had come to a pitifully premature end. And he was still perplexed at where Aska had sprung from. His best guess was that the dog had somehow got loose from his new owner and had been living stray in the city. But he couldn’t explain how his hound had been there at just that moment. At the time, Erlan had thought it a fair omen, some clever stitching of the Norns to change his fate. But now Erlan wondered whether Aska had been a mere trick of the mind, a strange phantom conjured by the substance Lucia had shoved down his throat. Because the stupid animal had led him straight into trouble. Erlan had followed his slinking shadow through a maze of dingy alleys only to spill into the grey light of morning on the embankment overlooking the Horn – and straight into a patrol of nightwatchmen. By then, there was such a hue and cry ringing through the district that they recognized him as a fugitive at once. He stood no chance, one lame man with a dagger against six soldiers with spears and clubs. Aska had vanished – leaving his master to be bludgeoned to the ground. So here he was. . .

The fountain was chuckling away, oblivious to whatever grim punishment was about to ruffle the courtyard’s careful serenity. A crowd of household servants was assembled. The hum of their voices continued as he was stripped to the waist and bound to a wooden frame at the foot of the marble staircase that led to the floor above.

Erlan could only wait and wonder. In the north, he would certainly die. A man’s pride could never suffer the insult Erlan had dealt Arbasdos so publicly. But the south was different. People had strange motives he didn’t understand. But whatever fate awaited him, it was going to be unpleasant.

All eyes rose to the gallery as General Arbasdos appeared from his private chambers, flanked by his spatharios, and descended the grand staircase. He stopped a few steps from the bottom, the spatharios beside him.