Haroun sneaked back to his fire. That had been killed and scattered. There was no sign that three men had slept there. The dead had been taken away.

Haroun ripped a strip from the edge of his cloak. He took a packet from a pocket inside his inner shirt, tucked the scrap inside. The herb in the packet had come most of the way from Lioantung. He rubbed it into the cloth, then worked the scrap into a crack in the wall where he had sat to sleep. It should look like something that had gotten caught there.

All set. Time to go.

There was no one in the stable when Haroun arrived. Odd, but his shaghûn senses discovered nothing else unusual. Maybe the night boy was shirking.

Haroun was preparing his animals when a long, hate-filled howl rolled across al-Habor. It was joined by another.

His cloth scrap had been found.

How many monsters had Magden Norath brought?

Bin Yousif thought of them as hellhounds but they better resembled large, stocky cats with hound-like heads.

As Haroun eased into the light of the setting moon he concluded that their number did not matter.

Men screamed. Monsters growled and shrieked in a fight fit for entertaining the gods. Haroun searched the sky, halfway expecting to see a winged horse against the starscape.

Still no stable boy. Surely the uproar should have brought him back. The master was bound to come, to make sure the animals were safe.

Haroun left a generous tip.

The sun would rise before long. Norath’s hounds should have to hide from the light. They could be rooted out and destroyed during the day.

If they did not destroy one another. If someone did not delude himself into thinking he could use them the way Norath had.

Haroun hoped his fireside brethren had gotten a good head start. They did not deserve to suffer for his crimes.

Megelin’s bodyguards were the best surviving Royalist warriors. They moved as quietly as they could, which was not especially so. The horses and camels were nervous. The deathcats had closed in too tight.

Megelin had told the damned sorcerer to leave the deathcats behind. Norath did not listen well. He had brought four monsters anyway.

Someday Norath would cease to be useful. After he made Megelin’s enemies die. Then he could join his victims in hell.

Pray this meeting went well. Norath’s mystery ally might hasten the opportunity.

Norath’s massive bulk rolled in the moonlight just yards ahead. The sorcerer had a distinctive walk because of injuries suffered during the Great Eastern Wars. He was badly bowlegged and had trouble changing course quickly.

Megelin’s loathing grew. He was downwind. The man stank.

Norath could stop suddenly, though. Megelin banged into him. “What the hell…?”