‘He risked his life for us. He didn’t have to do that. He didn’t have to do a thrice-damned thing.’

Tarfel cowered behind him, whimpering. Chel kept himself between the big man and the prince. He could feel a hot trickle of blood leaking from his nose.

‘We need to leave. And he’s coming too.’

Rennic nodded, the fury gone from his eyes as suddenly as it had come.

‘Then let’s go.’

THREE

Chel led them back at speed, ignoring the thumping pain in his head and shoulder. Rennic seemed in a daze, Tarfel likewise. They stepped over a pair of steaming corpses in the hallway as they approached the battlement. Nobody spoke.

The bell had stopped. Shouting filled the court of confession, the crowds below roiling and chanting, jostling for a better look. Confessors and clergy mixed with commoners, a great seething mass of humanity joined for the spectacle, some in ghoulish glee, some morbid fascination. And somewhere out in the courtyard, a panicked duke, screaming for guards, screaming about a missing prince and assassins in their midst.

On the central platform, beneath the gibbet, whatever remained of Dalim had been cleared away, now freed from sin – and any other earthly consideration – in the sight of the Shepherd and her merciful servants. Palo stood flanked by a pair of brawny confessors, small and hazy in the snow-glare. Over her stood Brother Hurkel, the great tin monster on metal legs, his red little head capped with the white wolf pelt. On the far side of the platform stood the royal gallery. Chel could almost make out the golden blur of Prince Corvel, front and centre.

Rennic crouched on the battlement and rubbed his eyes, peering at the gatehouse at the wall’s end. He was sprayed in drying blood and looked drained. ‘It’s as before, no change. We still have a chance.’

Chel nodded. ‘Let’s light a bolt and get things moving, shall we?’

Sab hovered over them, her relief at their return tempered by their battered state. She seemed particularly disturbed by Rennic’s gory appearance, and wouldn’t meet his eye. ‘This way.’

On the platform, Hurkel raised his arms, his missing hand replaced by a two-pronged fork. He began bellowing of Palo’s crimes, real and imagined, to the baying of the crowd. Chel watched his theatrics, his absent hand, and thought for a moment of Loveless, feeling a sharp pang of something he couldn’t name. His glance fell on Palo, now half-strapped to the confessor’s table. Even at this distance he could see she was impassive, detached.

Rennic had taken the crossbow from Tarfel’s arms without a word, slotting the bolt and tweaking the string. His gaze matched Chel’s, watching Hurkel raise the glowing brand from the platform’s brazier, seeing it steam in the frigid air. Chel realized he was shaking.

‘Can we save her?’

Rennic’s head shake was a mere twitch.