‘And what of this hole you were to blast into the cliff-face?’

‘Illusion. I’ve been preparing for days. I think I can do it.’

Brave and desperate. ‘Well, lass, your efforts seem to have far outstripped mine in ambition. I’d intended a little mayhem and not much more. You mentioned that Irriz and his men wouldn’t be worth much. What did you mean by that?’

‘I poisoned their water.’

Kalam blanched behind his mask. ‘Poison? What kind?’

Tralb.’

The assassin said nothing for a long moment. Then, ‘How much?’

She shrugged. ‘All that the healer had. Four vials. He once said he used it to stop tremors, such as afflicted old people.’

Aye. A drop. ‘When?’

‘Not long ago.’

‘So, unlikely anyone’s drunk it yet.’

‘Except maybe a guard or two.’

‘Wait here, lass.’ Kalam set out, silent in the darkness, until he came within sight of the three warriors manning the picket. Earlier, they had been seated. That was no longer the case. But there was movement, low to the ground – he slipped closer.

The three figures were spasming, writhing, their limbs jerking. Foam caked their mouths and blood had started from their bulging eyes. They had fouled themselves. A waterskin lay nearby in a patch of wet sand that was quickly disappearing beneath a carpet of capemoths.

The assassin drew his pig-sticker. He would have to be careful, since to come into contact with blood, spit or any other fluid was to invite a similar fate. The warriors were doomed to suffer like this for what to them would be an eternity – they would still be spasming by dawn, and would continue to do so until either their hearts gave out or they died from dehydration. Horribly, with Tralb it was often the latter rather than the former.

He reached the nearest one. Saw recognition in the man’s leaking eyes. Kalam raised his knife. Relief answered the gesture. The assassin drove the narrow-bladed weapon down into the guard’s left eye, angled upward. The body stiffened, then settled with a frothy sigh.

He quickly repeated the grisly task with the other two.

Then meticulously cleaned his knife in the sand.

Capemoths, wings rasping, were descending on the scene. Hunting rhizan quickly joined them. The air filled with the sound of crunching exoskeletons.

Kalam faced the camp. He would have to stove the casks. Enemies of the empire these warriors might be, but they deserved a more merciful death than this.

A faint skittering sound spun him around.

A rope had uncoiled down the cliff-face from the stone balcony. Figures began descending, silent and fast.

They had watchers.

The assassin waited.

Three in all, none armed with more than daggers. As they came forward one halted while still a dozen paces distant.

The lead man drew up before the assassin. ‘And who in Hood’s name are you?’ he hissed, gold flashing from his teeth.