Thoughts full of smugglers and thieves, Tobias opened the clasps on the haft of his watchman’s halberd and affixed his lantern beneath its blade. A twist of the mechanism and the clasps snapped shut, securing his lantern so that, when his halberd was lowered and pointed blade-first ahead of him, its light would shine out to light his way and blind potential miscreants. Tobias always thought of it as Sigmar’s light, an inescapable glare that transfixed wrong-doers and aided the God-King’s rightful servants.

Stepping carefully past Klaus, Tobias advanced into the alleyway. Lightning cracked on high, whitewashing the walls and floor then plunging them back into shadow. To Tobias’ right rose the flank of the Wayward King, all crumbling stone and a couple of small, dirty windows high up. To his left hunched a tenement, one of many built to house dock workers, and Tobias noted that the only windows on this side of the building were long-ago broken and boarded. It was a good spot for secretive deeds; no eyes upon it at all.

None but his and Sigmar’s.

In the beam of his lantern the dim suggestion of shapes resolved into something clear and, to Tobias’ mind, incriminating. A hole had been dug here, right into the foundations of the Wayward King. It was surrounded by rough heaps of spoil, dirt and old broken cobbles piled a foot deep on the alley floor.

Sloppy work. Professionals would have removed the debris to avoid attention being drawn to their efforts. And surely pointless, he reflected with puzzlement. The hatch that led to the tavern’s beer cellar was around the back of the building, in Drover’s Lane; he knew from experience that its lock had been broken and repaired so many times that a good kick was all it took to snap it off and gain access below. So why go to the trouble of digging a hole?

He paced closer, lantern beam swaying with his footsteps. Tobias’ body radiated tension. He was ready at any moment for some malcontent to spring from the pit, cudgel swinging.

Nothing moved but him.

Lightning flashed again as he reached the lip of the hole and saw that, sure enough, it led straight down into the tavern’s cellar. Or rather, he realised as he stared at it, it had been dug up and out of the cellar. The way the soil had been pushed up and heaped around left him in no doubt of that fact. Tobias’ frown deepened. He sank down on his haunches, playing the beam of his lantern around the edges of the pit.

‘This was dug with… claws? Burrowed by something?’ He glanced back and saw that Klaus had followed him a short way down the alley, but that the cat had now stopped, wide eyed and watchful, some way back. Klaus’ tail twitched with agitation. His fur bristled.