Now Kiska remembered her bindings and sawed frantically. Her ankles came free. Hardly knowing what she was doing, she reversed the blade to hack feverishly at the rope between her wrists.

Across the room came the scraping of claws as the hound leapt forward like a sprung catapult. It closed its jaws over the man’s head and clamped down. Bone crunched. Blood and mulched flesh flew from the hound’s maw. Tossing its head, the hound flicked the man’s headless torso away. It rolled to a stop close to Kiska’s booth, blood jetting across the floor. Kiska fought down the surge of bile at her throat.

Into the silence following, the veteran drawled, ‘Well, I guess the old man wasn’t listening.’ He tossed aside his sword to stand empty-handed.

The hound turned to regard him. Kiska also stared, fascinated by the man’s calm. From a pouch at his side he drew a round object about the size of a large fruit, dark green and shiny. His gaze caught Kiska’s and he nodded her to the rear stairwell.

He held up the object to the hound and pointed. ‘It’s just you and me now, boy.’

Kiska’s breath caught. She’d heard stories . . . she dived down the short stairs to the lower room, rolled, came up running. In the dark she slammed against a table, stood gagging for air. Barely able to straighten up, she glanced around and caught a shaft of moonlight near one wall illuminating a servant’s staircase.

From the room above pounded a man’s scream of pure rage and hate. Kiska staggered to the stairs, kicked open the bolted door at the end of a dry-goods larder, and ran straight out only to trip and smash down onto a gravel drive, wrenching her shoulder and cracking one knee. As she lay half conscious an explosion of light and heat punched a gasp of pain from her gut. A burst of flame blinded her, shards of wood tearing overhead, larger flaming pieces crashing down all around. She heard a long bray of pain that faded as the hound fled. Headed for the water perhaps.

Dead to any injury now, as if her nerves had burst beneath their strain, Kiska pushed herself upright and limped down the alley. Even had she broken her back, she knew she’d have dragged herself away from the horror of that slaughterhouse. Behind her what was left of the inn flared brightly into the night, lighting her path down the alley through burning timber and debris.

A wordless cry stopped Temper. It echoed from among a maze of alleyways to his right. A young woman, shrieking as if her soul itself were at stake. He froze, scanning among the dark openings. From the shadows ran a girl in dark clothing, her long black hair blowing about her face.

She saw him and hesitated, then called, ‘Please, help me. Please.’

He waved her forwards. ‘Damn, child, are you wounded? Where’s your home? Is it near?’

She threw herself onto him, a mere bundle of bones in his arms. She sobbed something, terrified.