As middle-aged as the others, without a single thing to differentiate her from the rest. Even her color and stature—golden skin, and very tall for a woman—were not particularly outstanding among mercenaries. Hired swords came from every corner of the known world, and some places outside it; Beaker had been odder-looking than this woman. She acted no differently than any of the others, not looking for special status, nor making herself conspicuous. Tarma drilled this recruit as remorselessly as the rest, and paid her no more attention, and no less.

Lyla Stormcloud was from the far south and west; past even the Dhorisha Plains. She was half Shin‘a’in, with the gold complexion of her father and the black eyes and wandering foot of her mother, a Full Bard who had double the normal wanderlust of that roaming profession. Life with a nomadic Clan had suited her perfectly, and Tale‘sedrin, made up as it was of orphans and adoptees, made her welcome there as she might not have been in a “pure” Clan. How they’d gloried in having a Full Bard with them.

A Full Bard with another profession as well, the one she had trained in as a child—the skills and training of which she passed in turn to her daughter.

Assassin.

It’s a good thing the Clans didn’t know that until long after she’d been accepted on the basis of her Talent and current profession. And it’s a damned good thing for her that she admitted it before someone ferreted the information out on his own. But I’m glad it happened, especially now. Try and get an assassin past another assassin.

Tarma furrowed her brow in thought, watching Lyla at her sword-work. Blessings on the Warrior, for sending her mother to Tale‘sedrin, and a double blessing that Lyla was willing to pack up and move on my say-so.

Lordan was in danger as long as Baron Reichert thought him vulnerable. If Tarma and her partner could stay here—well, nothing and no one was going to get past them. Now that Keth was no longer bound by the promises she’d made Rathgar, she could put mage-protections up that would stop any magical attack on her grandson short of an Adept-spell. And if Tarma could possibly have moved in here permanently—