Read Online Night of Knives by Ian C. Esslemont - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Ian C. Esslemont
Tags: Fantasy
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view it as nothing more than a quaint local custom during which souls, monsters,and fiends purportedly took to the streets. Her home’s backwater superstition shamed Kiska. Yet what if she did break off the surveillance? Run to hide in a sacred precinct or temple? If she abandoned the pursuit now she could already imagine the Claw commander’s sneer. After all, what more could one expect of local talent?
Ahead in the distance, flattened by the overcast gloom, her quarry and guards continued to climb the cobbled street. Ground fog rose now, swirling in the wind, as her target rounded a corner and vanished. Kiska kept behind cover. For all she knew they could be waiting just ahead. She could walk right past them and not know until cold iron slid between her ribs. Or, more likely, a knotted silk rope snapped about her neck like a noose.
Kiska tightened her cloak, tried to shake off her dread like the rain from its oiled weave. She would simply have to proceed under the assumption she’d yet to be spotted. Her nerves would rattle to pieces otherwise.
The corner revealed a carriage way, twin gullies pressed into the stones by centuries of wheels. The party had disappeared. Down the way, between tall walls, stood a massive gateway of carved wooden doors. Kiska knew what lay beyond. The E’Karial family manor. Smallish, compared to some of the town’s grander estates, but comfortable, or so it had looked from the outside on her nocturnal wanderings. It was also long abandoned. If this were a meeting, Kiska imagined its participants couldn’t have planned a more isolated location. Of course, it could also be that some massively ill-informed scion of the E’Karial family had arrived to inspect their inheritance.
She took several slow breaths, then crossed the carriage way to the mouth of the lane opposite, where ivy hung so thick she could hardly see through it. At each step her back prickled under imagined dagger-points. But the ivy-choked walls swallowed her without incident. She jogged to another alley,this one plain mud, that she knew led to a postern gate behind the estate. Edging around the pooled rainwater and fighting the thorny brush that snagged at her cloak, she nearly missed the recessed entry hidden in the shadows.
She knelt at the moss-covered door, rearranged her cloak, and listened. Raindrops pattered from leaf-tips, the wind rustled overhead through branches and, no more than a distant murmur, the ever-present surf punished the island’s shores. The door stank of rot while the arched recess retained the must of long-damp humus. She didn’t plan to open the door, of course. One glance was enough to tell
anyone
that was no longer possible: a portion of the wall’s weight had settled onto the frame. If she pushed on the rotted planks she’d probably tumble right through into the rear garden. This was simply a lower profile for listening than poking her head over the wall.
She heard no one and gave it long enough: fifty heart-beats. Most likely they were inside the estate. Time to try the wall. She stepped out of the recess and appraised the blocks and the vines that smothered their rough surface. No problem. For cover, she climbed up to where three aruscus trees rose as a clump within the compound. Head and shoulders above the top, she studied the landscaped garden. It looked even worse than the last time she’d seen it. Raised beds now held only dead stalks and weeds. A central tiled patio shone dully under the cover of dead leaves. And there, side by side on a marble bench so white it glowed in the night, two men sat. Kiska froze.
She’d heard nothing because neither spoke. Both looked to the southern sky. For all she could tell they were quietly studying the clouds. The one on her right was the man she’d followed, hood back, shaved scalp dark as rich loam, a long queue draped forward over one shoulder. The other was an old man, ghostly pale, white-haired, thin shoulders hunched like folded wings,
Ahead in the distance, flattened by the overcast gloom, her quarry and guards continued to climb the cobbled street. Ground fog rose now, swirling in the wind, as her target rounded a corner and vanished. Kiska kept behind cover. For all she knew they could be waiting just ahead. She could walk right past them and not know until cold iron slid between her ribs. Or, more likely, a knotted silk rope snapped about her neck like a noose.
Kiska tightened her cloak, tried to shake off her dread like the rain from its oiled weave. She would simply have to proceed under the assumption she’d yet to be spotted. Her nerves would rattle to pieces otherwise.
The corner revealed a carriage way, twin gullies pressed into the stones by centuries of wheels. The party had disappeared. Down the way, between tall walls, stood a massive gateway of carved wooden doors. Kiska knew what lay beyond. The E’Karial family manor. Smallish, compared to some of the town’s grander estates, but comfortable, or so it had looked from the outside on her nocturnal wanderings. It was also long abandoned. If this were a meeting, Kiska imagined its participants couldn’t have planned a more isolated location. Of course, it could also be that some massively ill-informed scion of the E’Karial family had arrived to inspect their inheritance.
She took several slow breaths, then crossed the carriage way to the mouth of the lane opposite, where ivy hung so thick she could hardly see through it. At each step her back prickled under imagined dagger-points. But the ivy-choked walls swallowed her without incident. She jogged to another alley,this one plain mud, that she knew led to a postern gate behind the estate. Edging around the pooled rainwater and fighting the thorny brush that snagged at her cloak, she nearly missed the recessed entry hidden in the shadows.
She knelt at the moss-covered door, rearranged her cloak, and listened. Raindrops pattered from leaf-tips, the wind rustled overhead through branches and, no more than a distant murmur, the ever-present surf punished the island’s shores. The door stank of rot while the arched recess retained the must of long-damp humus. She didn’t plan to open the door, of course. One glance was enough to tell
anyone
that was no longer possible: a portion of the wall’s weight had settled onto the frame. If she pushed on the rotted planks she’d probably tumble right through into the rear garden. This was simply a lower profile for listening than poking her head over the wall.
She heard no one and gave it long enough: fifty heart-beats. Most likely they were inside the estate. Time to try the wall. She stepped out of the recess and appraised the blocks and the vines that smothered their rough surface. No problem. For cover, she climbed up to where three aruscus trees rose as a clump within the compound. Head and shoulders above the top, she studied the landscaped garden. It looked even worse than the last time she’d seen it. Raised beds now held only dead stalks and weeds. A central tiled patio shone dully under the cover of dead leaves. And there, side by side on a marble bench so white it glowed in the night, two men sat. Kiska froze.
She’d heard nothing because neither spoke. Both looked to the southern sky. For all she could tell they were quietly studying the clouds. The one on her right was the man she’d followed, hood back, shaved scalp dark as rich loam, a long queue draped forward over one shoulder. The other was an old man, ghostly pale, white-haired, thin shoulders hunched like folded wings,
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