Heavy footsteps cut through the panic, sharp and cold as a snick of scissors. The Justice had arrived, fully dressed and accompanied by his vicious white hound, Barbarus, and a large cohort of his men. Constance stiffened, her jaw tightening. The captain had been right to worry about the Justice’s hidden army. The black-liveried guard surrounded the courtyard—they’d expected the news, Constance realized, somewhere behind her raging disbelief. She saw too the knowing glance that passed between the Justice and the physician.

Others arrived: Xander, who had gathered a handful of his men on his way from the west tower, and a number of the city guard, those who had been inside the castle or on patrol. She searched out Captain Trudan’s face—found it. He nodded at her respectfully. Xander stood close to her now. He met her eyes, shook his head in shock. Nobles and their ladies, dressed in bedclothes, clutched at each other, a few screaming or sobbing at the ghastly sight. Constance’s pulse raced. Her father was dead. She felt the force of two slaps, one six years past and the other two days ago, ringing in her ears like a new-struck bell.

And then, at last, her mind caught up. The Justice had arranged the murder. He had a plan. And it was starting now. She tightened her grip on her cane.

“The Duke is dead,” said the Justice, once everyone was gathered. He turned his eyes on Constance. “Constance Rathbone, Lady Protector, you are under arrest on suspicion of murder.”

A shocked silence fell across the courtyard as two of the Justice’s men stepped forward, reaching for Constance. Winton stood up from kneeling at the Duke’s side, the knees of his trews soaked dark with blood, and blocked their path.

“How dare you,” he said softly, and the chilly disbelief in his voice froze them in their tracks. “Our father is dead. How dare you accuse my sister.”

“Murder?” Constance faced the Justice calmly. “By what evidence?”

The Justice’s cold blue eyes flashed as he turned to address not Constance herself, but the crowd of onlookers. Barbarus growled low at his side, fixing her with its single pale-yellow eye. “No one can question my devotion to the Ancestors, or my determination to root out the wickedness responsible for the curse upon our city. Since returning to Duke’s Forest, my home, and my faith, it has been my life’s work. In my ten years of service, I have achieved a great deal, and yet not that which meant the most: the destruction of the storm cloud and those who caused its evil visitation upon our great city.” He stepped out, past the body on the cobblestones, his eyes falling but briefly on the corpse. “I had been searching in the wrong places. And with the prodigal daughter’s return, the answer fell into my hands.”