Risens clung to the assassins like a shadow. He pushed them hard as they rounded the switchbacks, climbing ever higher into the mountains. Through the darkness, he’d seen no signs of Orio and Feylen following. That they were not far behind, however, was a certainty. They’d been chosen for this mission for their prowess, and Risens would not take that for granted.

  The light of the fire that consumed a portion of the village had faded to a distant, flickering, orange glow before dissolving completely into darkness. At two separate points throughout the night, he watched a distinct, bright streak of light race upward through the sky. The flare hovered in the air for a few breaths before descending slowly back to the ground. Signals, no doubt from the traitorous bastards on their trail.

  At least two of the three were given a separate mission to accomplish. Between them and him, only one would return to provide a report to the King.

  He considered the implications as he jogged up the seemingly endless incline. His faith in the King and in the justifications of his orders had been broken irreparably. The murder of the civilians, beyond the pointless order to eliminate the warlord, was inexcusable. The citizens, asleep in their beds, had done nothing to deserve death. They posed neither a direct nor existential threat to the safety of Halthome.

  Why had he been sent on a journey, far from the confines of the city he hunted, beyond the realm that he protected?

  Was it that they hoped his body would never be found? That the evidence of his death would be hidden among the rocky crags until nothing more existed of him beyond bleached bones on the rocks?

  He was already a ghost. To them, he was a nameless, faceless assassin beyond the title he bore. The secrets Risens woreon his skin would define him far beyond the title he had earned by his unquestioning ruthlessness.

  Out of the assassins that had been sent in tow, had all been given the same coded instructions, or had it been provided only to the three?

  Either way, it was he who would be walking off the mountain alive.

  A sudden chill washed over him that had nothing to do with the frigid air.

  “Mind your surroundings and your company.”

  Those had been Fendri’s last private words to Risens. What did the steward know? Anything at all? It had seemed out of place at the time. Now, it appeared to be a true warning.

  That would need to be a future conversation. For now, he pushed Bakka and Destra hard through the night. The torrential rain that had harried them on their approach had given way to milder, yet still cold conditions. The winds cut through their clothes and into their skin, though neither of his companions complained.

  Dawn greeted them miles before they crested the peak of Breakker’s Pass. The details of his brief conversation with Trufang troubled him, and the warlord’s surprise at the mention of outposts on the mountainside was genuine. If these were not his soldiers lurking among the crags, then to whom did they belong?

  The pass was shared territory that bordered two kingdoms. It stood to reason that they hailed from one or the other. He believed Trufang that his people were simple farmers and that logic dictated they were from another province. This too seemed unreasonable, as the one-way passage of that many troops through the sleepy village would not have gone unnoticed.

  Thoughts of the other possibilities fueled his agitation. The King’s emissaries had passed through the mountains within the last month. The first patrol they encountered had mentioned that they had been there for roughly the same time. Why would the warlord have positioned them there if he was in the process of negotiating with King Lathrenon?

  Risens expected he knew. They served the same master, yet in very different capacities.

  He had allowed their pace to slacken with the coming light of day. This time, they would not stop and spend a night tucked away in a cave on the hill. If he were to close his eyes for anything longer than a blink in his present company, he may never again open them.

  It wasn’t difficult for him to understand his proclivity toward working alone. Having to be perpetually on guard for enemies was something he was well accustomed to. Watching companions entirely sabotaged the purpose of having them there in the first place. In the early hours of the morning, he’d witnessed the quick movements of two individuals as they rounded the switchbacks of the pass. They made no attempts at hiding their presence. He knew Orio and Feylen were on their trail, and so, too, did the others.

  Gauging the wind that cut through the peaks was always a guessing game. One moment, it would be a gentle breeze pulling from the south, carrying particles of ice from the lofty frozen heights of the pinnacles high above. Other times, it would race through the pass seemingly changing direction at a whim, whipping out clothing and hair as it circled. Their progress ground to a halt as the breeze—this time, mild and agreeable—brought the scent of something foul.

  It was death.

  In massive quantities.

  He exchanged glances with Bakka and Destra.

  They all took heavy draughts from their water skins. They had paused for a second at every spring they encountered, working to hold the sudden, rapid change in elevation at bay. As callous as it seemed, up until this point, he hadn’t cared if he ran them to the ground and was forced to return on his own. That they had stuck with him, maintained his pace and pressure without failing and without griping, was a step, albeit small, to the redemption of their trust.

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  “It’s far too quiet being this close to the outpost.” Bakka talked in short bursts between labored breaths. “This odor doesn’t bode well. I think we all know what we will find.”

  “Do we press on, or do we investigate?” Destra shared a similar heavy breathing, yet both men were fantastically fit. “Expecting that I know what our research will uncover, I find that I prefer running, thank you very much.”

  Risens allowed a slight grin to pull at the corners of his lips, not worrying to hide it as the face wrap and the Shadows Shroud provided plenty of layers of disguise. If he were in a position to trust either of the assassins entirely, he believed that he would have genuinely enjoyed their company, regardless of how infinitely different they were.

  “I knew you’d say that,” Destra droned as he straightened himself out.

  “I said nothing,” Risens offered.

  “Don’t worry.” Destra stretched, cracking his back and knuckles. “I’ll take the lead. I know Bakka here wouldn’t resort to stabbing me in the back. Finally figured out that the trio was sent to do more than just eliminate a warlord, didn’t you?”

  “You knew?”

  Destra shook his head. “A hunch. Nothing more.”

  Risens nodded. “Lead on.”

  Risens watched them both closely as Bakka followed close behind Destra. Allowing Risens to take the rear revealed more than they perhaps knew. The longer he’d spent in the presence of these two, the more he doubted that they were sent to kill him. He expected that if the others were to catch them, there would be no words before blades were drawn in battle. At that point, he would be happy to let the Talons hunt.

  The outpost, hidden among the rocks, was positioned several hundred meters off the winding roadbed of the pass. More than double in size than the first, it only amounted to a significantly increased disaster when they finally reached the remains. The method was brutally similar only on a far broader scale.

  The signal fire, one that he assumed was purely for show, was the only feature left standing in the remains of the camp. The fires had long since died. Scraps, pieces, and appendages of what had once been soldiers lay in partially frozen chunks scattered amid the tattered tents and wood. A few blades, bent and pitted, were present in the wreckage. The rest remained secured in scabbards where they had been when their sanctuary in the mountains had been ravaged.

  “I’ve thought long and hard over the last few days. Ever since we stumbled upon the first ruin a few days ago.” Bakka whispered, his hands hovering close to his daggers as he scanned the area around and above the outpost. “There is nothing that I can account for that would have been able to accomplish what destroyed the first station. The level of total and complete annihilation here is beyond my understanding.”

  As Risens likewise surveyed the area, he could not disagree.

  “I was raised in the shadows of the Shial Slivers,” Bakka intoned with an already surprising amount of personal information for an assassin. “Whatever did this? This is not natural to these ranges. Of course, there were always stories told to keep the children from wandering off into the mountains. Not even in those was there anything like this.”

  Again, Risens agreed.

  The curious destruction of the first outpost had troubled him. Most deaths were easily attributed to a likely predator, though nothing in his mind gave him any understanding of this. What known predator could have done such a thing? None.

  He scanned the scene once more, looking for any clues that he’d missed. Finding none, he turned his vision to the sky. The morning had dawned clear, with only a few wispy clouds marring the otherwise blemishless sky. It was odd that even with so much death on the air, no scavenger appeared for an easy feast.

  “I have no desire to find out what caused this,” Risens whispered. The remains scattered around the scene were cold, though by his best judgment, the massacre had happened sometime within the last day. “The pass slopes downhill from here. I want nothing more than to be off this bloody rock.”

  As with the previous outpost, there were no tracks left among the frozen stones that offered any insight. Vicious scars tornthrough the victims, and the scattered bits of the bodies proved it was perpetrated by something large and incredibly strong.

  With their heads on swivels, they hastened from the ruins toward the winding road leading down the pass. They hadn’t gone far when their progress was again halted. This time, it was not just a feeling, but the trembling ground that sounded the alarm.

  It started as a slight tremor.

  Barely noted through the soles of his boots, it was only a hint at first, a confusing buzzing underfoot. It quickly intensified, taking on a thunderous roar. The grating of stone against stone ripped through the air as they were tossed from their feet. It felt as if the very mountain itself shifted.

  As quickly as it had come, the violent shuddering stopped. Quiet reverberations continued as if the mountain had been rattled by the same fear he and his companions had experienced at the sight of yet another death-filled outpost.

  Scattered cracking sounds filled the air, yet there were no rain clouds above. Risens tracked the movement of stones from the peaks. Loose stone separated from the cliff faces, skipping down the steep rocks, splintering as they crashed into solid and immovable boulders. Somewhere off to the south, a massive section of the mountain cleaved in two near the peak, grinding down the cliff face in a deadly mixture of snow and stone that rumbled like distant thunder.

  “Find refuge!” Risens shouted, but the other two men needed no such encouragement.

  They sought shelter where they could, though thankfully, the relatively flat section of the mountain they occupied was isolated from the repercussions of the quake. Even so, rocks of varying sizes smashed into the remains of the ill-fated encampment. The lofty peak that towered still several thousand meters above them groaned alarmingly, though the snow, ice, and stone held. If it gave way, he expected there was nothing they could do to escape its deadly slide.

  As if Risens needed any further convincing to be free of the mountain pass, this was merely another detail that would hasten his steps. Windwake was situated on a vast stretch of gently undulating land bordering the Sea Solace. Earthquakes, while seldom, were not unheard of. Landslides and death by falling rocks were not typical hazards in the city. Still, he was wise enough to understand when he’d overstayed his welcome.

  He wanted nothing more than to be free of this mountain.

  This mission was a harsh castigation. Having potentially earned the ire of the King enough so that assassins would’ve been commanded to kill him, his life would now be increasingly complicated. Where else would he go?

  He needed the Roost. He needed to be stronger. The limitless power and talent hidden within the hallowed temple called to him, demanded his attention.

  He would make himself strong enough so that not even the King and his many trained killers would pose a threat.

  “Is it over?” Destra asked.

  “For now, it seems, Risens answered.

  “If there’s any luck with us still, if the gods truly care, Orio and Feylen’s frozen remains will not be found for ages.”

  It was a dark thought, but one Risens couldn’t help but hope for.

  “Let’s go, while we can,” he said.

  Regaining their footing, they hastened from the tenuous shelter of the boulders they crouched behind. Stealth was no longer a necessity. Speed was what would now be required. The concern over whatever had destroyed the encampment remained, yet a far more tangible danger loomed, one of stones, ice, and unavoidable death.

  Shouted voices, far closer than he could have anticipated, forced their stop. Their delay at the outpost, while unavoidable, was costly.

  Orio hailed them again as he and Feylen jogged around the corner after them.

  Both had blades in their hands.