 conflict that will force him to come to terms with his own tortured past if he wants to survive.
To my father, Major Joe William Carr, USAF, and to all the other men and women who carry the wounds of war on their body and in their spirit.
are found understanding and wisdom. Know and learn.
Robin turned away at the mention of Elwin’s brother, unwilling, perhaps, to intrude upon the grief that still seemed so recent. “What of his gift?” he asked softly.
“Convenient,” Robin said without explaining.
Elwin nodded. “Yes, we can visit Faran and see if there is any way he can replenish the sentinels more quickly.” The thought of the journey north wearied him. 
He twitched the reins, and they rode northwest, following a trail only he could sense, deeper into the kingdom of Collum.
Jeb ran the city watch and did it well. If it came to brawling or persuading some poor unfortunate to confess, Jeb’s methods yielded results. His fists served as a fair approximation of iron, and he enjoyed using them to convince people to mend the error of their ways. It was amazing how the sound of his knuckles popping loosened a man’s tongue.
But murder presented a different challenge, particularly one without witnesses or one involving people of importance. Jeb’s persuasion couldn’t quicken the tongues of the dead, which explained Gareth’s presence at my door. And I had proven my worth to the king. A year prior, I’d had the mixed fortune of solving a crime that earned me his favor. Over the objections of the rest of the nobility, the king raised me to lordship, though without lands or gift. I became the least in his service. My current duties were the price I paid for my nobility and another reward he’d given me that I esteemed more highly.
We exited the halls of King Laidir’s stronghold and came out onto one of the blocky staircases that led downward, descending the massive tor on which it had been built, carved from gut rock. Enormous granite stones merged with the mountain that defined the ponderous edifice of Laidir’s seat. The vertical walls were high enough to be impervious to ladders, and the surrounding landscape made it difficult to bring siege engines close enough to do any real damage.
The massive city of Bunard, King Laidir’s seat of power, spread beneath us. The Rinwash River curved around the stronghold to the north and west, but the river had been diverted into channels to supply water to each quarter of the city. If the sun had been up I could have seen the bridges connecting each section of the city, but in the darkness only the ends were visible, illuminated by the watch fires at each bank.
I followed Gareth downward until we arrived at the king’s stables, the smell of horse strong in the still air of the morning. Mounting quickly, we set out for the lower merchants’ quarter as the sky showed hints of slate in the east, riding southwest, passing by the four massive cathedrals of the divisions of the church, each with their criers’ stand out front—thankfully empty. I appreciated the silence. By the time I returned, the day’s chosen lector would be out front, declaring each division’s interpretation of the Word for the unbelieving.
After crossing the first bridge, we rode through the opulence of those living nearest His Majesty, structures just short of castles, with broad sweeping arches and stained-glass ballrooms. The scarcity of land precluded the types of formal grounds many of them maintained in their holdings, but their meticulously groomed gardens exuded wealth and order just the same.
They were as welcoming as iron.
We crossed the next bridge over the Rinwash, heading into the upper merchants’ quarter, and turned south, passing homes nearly the equal of the nobility, though they lacked the space for private gardens and they held about themselves the concentrated energy of those focused on profit.
When we passed over the next bridge, the buildings changed from heavy-cut granite to wood, first with several stories, then with just two or one, their plain windows already glowing as those within began preparations for their day in the marketplace or at their craft. The ring of a hammer started somewhere off to my right, and the smell of bread drifted to me, reminding me I’d yet to eat.
I pulled the mist of predawn into my lungs and squinted through the darkness. Some might resent the studied aloofness of a Merum priest or the zeal of the Vanguard, and others might even take exception to the aggressive mercy practiced by the Absold. But no one in their right mind begrudged a Servant. They seldom preached—the only exception being their crier—wouldn’t fight or try to change anyone. They served others. But for some reason, two men of the most humble of the four orders on the continent had been attacked. My heart quickened again.
We rounded a corner and came to the edge of a small grassy area bordering a clump of plain wooden buildings that huddled against the dark. A stone wall about eight feet high separated the area from the bank of one of the man-made branches of the Rinwash River.
Gareth pointed to a pile of limbs and cloth sprawled against the base of the wall. Here and there pale white skin showed against stone or fabric. Dark wet blotches covered the tunic. Gaping wounds assaulted my vision as the smell of blood hit my nose, and I fought to keep the remnants of my last meal in place. Gareth said something that almost penetrated the spell cast by the dead man, but none of the words registered as important.
Robin didn’t answer, of course. I was too late, as I always was.
He wandered from spot to spot on the grounds, careful to avoid touching the body or disturbing the scuff marks in the turf where the earth bore witness. I turned from the pull of Robin’s gaze with an effort and climbed the steps to the top of the wall, my mind split between trying to understand what lay before me and worry. There’d been blood on my cloak.
From my elevated vantage point, the extremity of Robin’s defense became clear. The grass, trampled by the attack, flowed back and forth like the strokes of a painter. My experience in battle didn’t rival Gareth’s, but even I could see Robin had fought bravely and well, very well. That last fact struck me, and I stopped to consider its implications. Too well for a Servant.
We traced and read the desperation of Robin’s defeat written in splashes of blood on the ground until we stood over him once more. A few feet away to Robin’s left the grass had been flattened and a sluggish pool of blood marked one end of the spot. I knelt, searching the ground under the yellow light of Gareth’s torch. Droplets of blood littered the grass, smudges really.
Gareth nodded, but something seemed wrong. Elwin should have been behind Robin, but from the scuffs in the grass and the blood spatters, it appeared he’d been out to one side or possibly in front when his enemies took him. “Why would he be here?” I muttered, not meaning for my voice to carry, but Gareth heard me anyway.
This was why I needed Gareth. Whatever he lacked in insight or intuition, he made up for in observation. With ten years more experience in the king’s service, he’d seen enough dying to make him an expert, but the stares of the dead held no interest for him.
I retraced the track of Robin’s struggle over to his body, where I rolled him over and searched his clothes. A heavy jingle drew my attention, and I cut his purse free and dumped the contents. My pulse quickened once more as a glint of yellow, so rare as to be almost illegal, tumbled into my hand.
I almost stood then, but something about the rents in Robin’s clothing stopped me. I’d been in the last border war and had seen plenty of dead and injured, but the holes in in his tunic and breeches were unique in their similarity. I examined a pair of wounds on his right thigh before unfastening the buttons of his coat and lifting his shirt to inspect the damage on his stomach and chest.
I shifted the body to get a better look.  I probed one of the wounds on his chest. A slash, not a thrust, about a hand wide ran horizontally, or nearly so, across Robin’s right side, the wound much deeper in the center than either side. Curious, I checked a couple more, then compared them to the wounds on his thighs. Every wound appeared the same, a clean cut nearly a hand wide and almost as deep, like sword or dagger slashes, but something about the depth bothered me—like a face that should have been familiar but wasn’t—and I stared, trying to place it.
Robin’s fist still clenched a sword, and there was blood on the blade. By the light of Gareth’s torch, I inspected the nicks on the edges. No, not nicks, something else. Nicks from sword parries left small triangular notches in the edge of a blade. Instead, Robin’s blade had small arc-shaped dents, as if he’d tried to hack through the bars of a prison. I pried the sword from his grasp and tucked it into my belt, behind my own.
I