Haroun caressed the hilt of his favorite knife, gently, and wondered about the sorcerer who had detected his careful probe.

Another group of men rushed Haroun’s former shadow from another direction.

Incomprehensible calls indicated that more men were coming.

Silhouettes glided into sight, following the half-dozen who had passed by earlier, three in a loose wedge followed by a man who was nearly a giant.

Haroun did not think. He responded without calculation, lightning striking. He leapt onto the devil’s back, left hand seizing his chin and pulling, right hand yanking his knife across the man’s throat, slicing deep enough to cut the windpipe before the sorcerer could utter the first syllable of a protective spell. The slash cut all the way to the spine. Carotid and jugular spewed.

Bin Yousif threw himself clear, drove his knife into the belly of Magden Norath’s nearest companion, who shrieked as he went down. He slashed another man’s raised left arm. The third turned to run. He died from a thrust into his back.

Haroun ran the other direction after taking a moment to drive his knife into the sorcerer’s left temple. He considered taking the head away, to destroy it a fragment at a time, but Norath’s men had begun to react.

He became another shadow moving through shadows.

He was calm the whole time, from the moment he felt his knife slice Norath’s esophagus. This was his life. This was what he had been born to do, till the day he made his lethal mistake. Cut, slash, stab, and walk away before anyone could respond.

Once out of sight he had serious advantages.

Norath’s men could not know who they were hunting. He knew that anyone searching must be an enemy.

Magden Norath, though! How could that be? In his way, in his time, Norath had been as terrible as the Empire Destroyer. How could he have fallen so easily?

Norath had gotten sloppy. He had failed to protect himself because he had seen no need. Death had been on him before he knew he was in danger. It was the story of every mouse ever taken by an owl, fox, or snake.

Death was always one inattentive moment away.

Things began to prowl the night, hunting, things created by Magden Norath. Though hardly the savan dalage the sorcerer had loosed during the Great Eastern Wars, they were formidable. They were confused. Haroun ambushed one that came within striking distance. It died. He was amazed.

The threat faded.

Norath was dead. The hunt for his murderer went on hiatus while the sorcerer’s men surrounded another member of their party. Him they hurried to safety inside the Sheyik’s compound.

Amazing, Haroun thought. The course of history might have been changed.

He had to get out of al-Habor. There would be a big, serious hunt once those men got themselves together. They would loose Norath’s monsters—unless they just killed the beasts rather than try to manage them without the sorcerer’s help.