“No!” Mat yelled. “Let it—”

Too late. The gholam indifferently slid between the pikes, grabbing each man’s throat in a hand, then crushing its fingers together. With a spin, it ripped free their flesh, dropping both men. Then it was off into the darkness.

Burn you! Mat thought, starting to dash after it. I’ll gut you and—

He froze. Blood in the air. From inside his tent. He had nearly forgotten that.

Olver! Mat scrambled back to the tent. It was dark within, though the scent of blood once again assaulted him. “Light! Teslyn, can you—”

A globe of light appeared behind him.

The light of her globe was enough to illuminate a terrible scene inside. Lopin, Mat’s serving man, lay dead, his blood darkening the tent floor in a large black pool. Two other men—Riddem and Will Reeve, Redarms who had been guarding his door—were heaped onto his sleeping pallet. He should have noticed that they were missing from their post. Fool!

Mat felt a stab of sorrow for the dead. Lopin, who had only recently shown that he was recovered from Nalesean’s death. Light burn him, he had been a good man! Not even a soldier, just a serving man, content to have someone to take care of. Mat now felt terrible for having complained about him. Without Lopin’s help, Mat would not have been able to escape Ebou Dar.

And the four Redarms, two of whom had survived Ebou Dar and the gholam’s previous attack.

I should have sent word, Mat thought. Should have put the entire camp on alert. Would that have done any good? The gholam had proven itself practically unstoppable. Mat had the suspicion that it could cut down the entire Band in getting to him, if it needed to. Only its master’s command that it avoid attention prevented it from doing so.

He did not see any sign of Olver, though the boy should have been sleeping on his pallet in the corner. Lopin’s blood had pooled nearby, and Olver’s blanket was soaking it up from the bottom. Mat took a deep breath and began searching through the shambles, overturning blankets and looking behind travel furniture, worried at what he might find.

More soldiers arrived, cursing. The camp was coming alert: horns of warning blowing, lanterns being lit, armor clanking.

“Olver,” Mat said to the soldiers gathering at his doorway. He had searched the entire bloody tent! “Has anyone seen him?”

“I think he was with Noal,” said Slone Maddow, a wide-eared Redarm. “They—”

Mat shoved his way out of the tent, then ran through camp toward Noal’s tent. He arrived just as the white-haired man was stepping out, looking about in alarm.

“Olver?” Mat asked, reaching the older man.

“He’s safe, Mat,” Noal said, grimacing. “I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to alarm you. We were playing Snakes and Foxes, and the boy fell asleep on my floor. I pulled a blanket over him; he’s been staying up so late waiting for you these nights that I figured it was best not to wake him. I should have sent word.”