‘Damn it, Selvador, when will you open your eyes?’ she muttered, fighting down the compulsion to go and speak to the regent militant again directly. He had been cloistered away for days now, allegedly deep in prayer, but he had issued no new edicts and offered no additional aid. Her entreaties to the arch-lector had produced nothing, either. The man was a climber, who was no doubt hoping she would appear the alarmist and allow him to expand his control to the watch as well when she was inevitably dismissed.

And still her dreams continued.

Hendrick, Bartiman and Olt stood outside the Alchemists’ Guild beneath a pair of wide leather scald-shades. Hendrick was trying to avoid the worst of the downpour. Captain Morthan had sent the scald-shades along with their first assignments, seals of marque that would allow the Swords of Sigmar to operate under her authority, and enough heavy leather rain-capes for all of them. With the weather this dreadful, her note had explained, they would all be scalded by nightfall if they didn’t wear them. The sergeant and his followers had made use of all the captain’s gifts every day since.

The guildhouse loomed over him now, an impressive brick pile painted in thick layers of rain-proofing whitewash and adorned with dozens of weird gargoyles above its arched windows.

‘Not many folk stupid enough to be out in this,’ commented Olt, glowering up and down the empty street. They had seen precious few people on their way from the Drake’s Crown, and those they passed hurried along under the lowering thunderheads, swaddled in rain-cloaks and not looking one another in the eye. This street boasted several well-to-do looking shop fronts, and lamps burned hopefully in a couple of windows, but most were dark and quiet.

‘It’s not just the rain, though, is it?’ asked Bartiman. ‘Whatever deviltry is at work here, why, you’d have to be a lump of rock not to feel it. Or Borik,’ he added speculatively, and Olt snorted.

‘Is there a difference?’

‘Borik and the others have their own assignments,’ said Hendrick, his tone communicating he was unamused. ‘We’re here for this place. The report said they’ve had two separate break-ins now, both times via tunnels penetrating the building’s basement level.’

‘And Captain Morthan thinks someone stealing bottles from alchemists is worth our attention, does she?’ asked Bartiman. ‘I mean, it’s her time, her money, but after all that about deaths and disappearances… omens… what have you…’ He trailed off with a wafting of hands, then leaned heavily on his staff and harrumphed to himself.

‘Did she strike you as a time-waster?’ asked Hendrick.

‘Nope,’ Olt replied without pause. ‘Steel ’n’ fire, that one.’