Viktor let the bodies fall. Constans stared at him with dark, disbelieving eyes. The lad had courage, at least.

“Uncle Viktor?”

Viktor gathered the trembling boy into an embrace. “Where’s Malachi? Where’s your father?”

“They came for him. Uncle Josiri too. We had to run.”

A swell of rage fought the cold of Viktor’s shadow. So he’d only been the first? Viktor saw no need to ask who “they” were. Not with two of Ebigail Kiradin’s hearthguard lying dead at his feet.

“And your mother? Your sister?”

Constans pointed back the way he’d come.

Viktor released the boy and slid the sword from the dead captain’s scabbard.

“Stay close,” he rumbled.

The girl was halfway along the gantry by the time Apara’s vision cleared. She had her mother’s left arm across her shoulders. The right still clasped a hand to an injured face.

Blinking away blue-black splotches, Apara soared across the intervening span. A thrust of her elbow knocked the mother clear. Then she had one hand across the girl’s mouth, and her claws against her throat.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” she breathed, “but I’ll slice you open if you do that again. Do you understand me?”

Sidara nodded. Her quick, shallow breaths rushed over Apara’s fingers. Apara tried not to think about the threat she’d just made, and to whom. She let her hand fall.

“I didn’t mean to,” the girl whimpered. “Don’t hurt my mother.”

“Viktor Akadra!” shouted Apara. “I know you’re here! Show yourself, and I’ll let the child go!”

How far she’d get with the foundry full of Freemont hearthguard was another matter, but that was hardly Apara’s concern.

“Well, Lord Akadra! What’s it to be?”

The mother lowered her hand from her face. Ragged gouges ran from chin to brow across her right cheek. “Please,” she begged. “Let my daughter go. You have me. I won’t fight.”

Apara brushed the girl’s cheek. “As long as I hold her, I have you both. I’m guessing a man of Lord Akadra’s reputation won’t easily pass that up.”

“Are you certain?” Akadra emerged from the darkness of the gantry, the boy trailing behind him. “Of late, Lord Akadra’s reputation is not what it was.”

“You’re here, aren’t you?”

“And in some demand, it would seem. What do you want?”

Apara hesitated. Akadra was most definitely not what she’d expected. The title of Council Champion carried the image of a battle-tempered brute, with as much muscle between his ears as in his sword arm. The bruised giant looked the part, but his voice lay heavily at odds.

“It’s very simple.” She filled her voice with ebbing confidence. “You die. They live.”

He stepped closer. “No. That isn’t what’s going to happen.”

Apara gripped Sidara’s forehead. “Stay back!”