Two companies of the 7th barred the palace steps, swords out and shields levelled. Behind them, Ebigail Kiradin stood before the great iron-studded doors, a knot of Freemont hearthguard at her side. She stood rigid and unmoving, her ice-white dress billowing in the grasp of the same northerly wind that carried her words clear across the plaza.

“. . . your council has failed you. I have failed you. Lumestra charged us to remain vigilant against the Dark, and we have not. Poison has crept into our veins – into the very lifeblood of our greatest families! Tolerance for the shiftless and lazy! For the southwealders! Yes, even for the shadowthorns!”

Malachi watched agape. “What is this?”

“I don’t know.” Josiri’s eyes were everywhere but on Ebigail.

“I, more than any, have paid a price for our laxness. My son, Kasamor, whom I know many of you loved, torn apart by those he trusted! His sister, taken from me this very night by those who seek my silence! But I am Ebigail Kiradin! I do not bend my knee to murderers and assassins! I will not let them do to you what they have done to me!”

The crowd’s muttering swelled to a low growl.

Malachi frowned. Kasamor had been popular, not least within the 7th. As for the rest . . . “But Sevaka lives! I must speak with Ebigail.”

Josiri grabbed his arm. “Don’t.”

Ebigail spread her hands. “Our fair city. Our beautiful, glorious Republic. It is rotten to the core! Eroded from within by those in whom we have placed our trust. Last night, they came for me! But for my steward, I’d have joined my dear children in the mists.”

She gestured. The palace gates swung inward. A kraikon strode out into the light, a great baulk of timber held aloft like a banner-pole. But no flag fluttered in the wind, no bright heraldic silks. Instead, it bore what Malachi at first took for a bundle of rags. But as he peered closer, he made out hands and feet twisted and bound behind the pole, and the steel glint of mooring spikes driven through green cloth into shoulder and thigh. A ragged gasp rippled through the crowd. A sword hilt projected from her shoulder.

Stone hands gripped Malachi’s gut. “No!”

Ebigail cast a triumphant hand towards the macabre display. “My would-be assassin! A markhaini spirit conjured from the mists. A thing that bears the likeness of one of our greatest heroes, but which does not bleed!”

Another gesture, and the kraikon set finger and thumb to the silvered sword-hilt and twisted. Rosa slammed her head against timber. Her desperate scream ripped across the plaza. Not one drop of blood flowed.

Malachi pinched his eyes shut and fought for breath. “We have to go back.”

Josiri’s eyes widened in disbelief. “You can’t let this continue!”