Pilos rubbed grit from his eyes and hissed between his teeth as the stitches above his knee tugged against the raw flesh. The man had died early from his wounds, but birds had begun to sing the sun’s arrival before the woman finally broke. Pilos had been deeply unsurprised by her revelation.

‘It is vital that I attend the council this morning, and not only to say farewell to the Singer. I have finally gathered enough support in the council to be given leave to raise my proposal – which is likely why the attack came last night.’

‘But why would she think it a bad idea?’

Pilos shrugged and then yawned. ‘Who knows what goes on in her head? This way, she’ll be off balance at my appearance – at my survival – and might make her opinion known when the proposal itself is put to council. Now, are you well enough to act as escort?’

Elaq sucked in an outraged breath and Pilos winked before he could expel it along with a protest. The retired eagle had taken a javelin in the shoulder and a cut across his forearm in the fighting, he and the other guards dispatching half a dozen more assassins who’d fought a holding action to give the trio time to reach Pilos. He made no complaint about either wound.

‘And during the council meeting?’ Elaq continued, noting Pilos’s hiss of pain as he flexed his leg again. ‘With everything we now know …’

‘If I am not safe in the very presence of the Singer himself, I’m not safe anywhere.’ He ignored the supreme irony of that statement: the Singer could order him killed and the words wouldn’t have time to stop echoing before the deed was carried out. Still, not even the councillors or Xac’s favourites were stupid enough to attempt an assassination in the source itself.

‘Then you’ll have a guard of three plus myself on the way to the pyramid.’

Pilos nodded, knowing that Elaq wouldn’t be swayed from this and secretly glad for it. The eagle closed the curtains to his litter in sombre rebuttal of the morning.

The doors to the compound creaked open and the sounds of early morning rushed in; turkeys and dogs and children all chasing each other through the streets, the first vendors hawking their wares even though dawn had barely kissed the sky. The stands of palm and bamboo growing on every corner rustled as they passed.

Pilos set his eye to a gap in the curtains, watching for further attacks, his club in his lap and knives in his belt.

‘Spear of the Singer Pilos, High Feather of the Melody, requests entrance to this council.’