There were still two attackers coming, and they were past Vass now, one on either side of her. Chetta met the eyes of the woman bearing down on her and drew back her cane. She’d only get one chance at this.

The assassin’s face split into a grin as metallic subdermal claws sprouted from her fingertips. They weren’t long, but they were long enough to rip Chetta’s throat out, and the assassin had already recognised that even Chetta’s strongest blow wouldn’t be enough to inconvenience her.

Chetta thumbed the secret switch on her cane’s handle, and swung it.

The power field erupted into life from the delicate filigree of projection lines that ran through the cane’s body, just before it made contact with the assassin’s ribs. Chetta’s right arm was thrown back so hard she felt her shoulder click, and she stumbled from the impact. The assassin was sent flying sideways to land in a stunned heap on the grass just in front of the shocked Ezallien Taranthis.

Vittariel slapped the Brobantis crest on his left breast and was immediately engulfed in a shimmering field of light as his personal refractor field activated. The last assassin rushed at him, arms wide as though seeking an embrace with a long-lost love, and Vittariel clenched his fist to extend the concealed blade from the vambrace beneath his coat sleeve.

There was a thunderous discharge, a flash that seared itself into Chetta’s retinas, and a blast of heat so fierce it felt as though a doorway had opened into the fiery netherworld of some primitive religion. Chetta was knocked off her feet by it, and the lush grass was not enough to cushion her fall. Her hip flared with agony, and she cried out as a spasm tore up her spine. She flailed, fighting against her body’s demands that she lay still and not move, desperately trying to get back to her feet and regain what limited mobility she could muster. She was too experienced a campaigner to think that the danger had passed.

She was correct. As she clawed her way over onto her front, looking to at least get her arms under her and push herself up, she saw the fire-eater slow from a running approach to tip something into her mouth and raise the lit taper with her other hand…

Four beams of ruby light stabbed out from the rings on Indrinian Vass’ right hand – digi-lasers, Chetta realised, the damned rogue trader had been wearing eight fully charged digi-lasers into every social engagement! – and punched their way through the woman’s torso. She slumped like a puppet with its strings cut, and as she landed on the grass some of the fluid must have leaked out of her suddenly slack mouth and met the sputtering flame of the taper, because there was another flash and her head exploded.