The guards advanced with the same predatory look as Raven’s crew, clutching swords and crossbows. "Get him," one shouted.
Cornered and prepared to fight, Nightfall brandished his knife, dropping his center of gravity. Several guards charged. Nightfall dodged. His ankle cracked against a gargoyle. Stone gave beneath his foot, pitching him backward. For an instant, he seemed to hover in midair. Then he plummeted from the parapets.
Nightfall screamed. Wind sliced through his loincloth, spinning him like flotsam beneath errant waves. Desperation scattered his wits. Helplessly, he clawed air. Within seconds, tree branches scratched his face and hands. Limbs shattered, knocking him sideways. Then, logic returned. He channeled all thought in one direction, driving his weight downward until his loincloth became heavier than his body.
Air resistance slowed Nightfall’s descent. Branches brushed aside harmlessly, and he floated toward the forest floor little faster than the leaves his fall had dislodged. He hit the ground, breath driven from his lungs, staring through intertwined branches at a distant line of loaded crossbows.
Nightfall lay still, his consciousness wavering, aware any sudden movement would hurl him into blackness. Despite his dangerous occupation and his gift of weight shifting, he possessed a normal man’s fear of heights. Never before had he tested his talent so abruptly nor relied upon it so completely. Have to run. Gotta get out of here quickly.
Something struck the ground near his head. Painfully, methodically, he swiveled his neck toward it, staring down the shaft of a bolt to its purple and silver feathers.
"Don’t move, Nightfall." A red-haired commander spoke. He knelt on the ledge of the parapet, a crossbow leveled at Nightfall’s head. "I don’t know what demon blessed you. I don’t know how you survived that fall, and I don’t want to know. The king wants you questioned. He’ll take your wicked, ugly, disgusting, murdering soul, I’m going to see that his will is done. But if you so much as quiver if you give me the slightest excuse, I’ll shoot you dead and revel in it."
Though he had landed relatively lightly, Nightfall felt bruised all over. A double stab of pain told him he had broken another rib, and his back ached badly enough to warn of a possibly serious injury. Vertigo gripped him. Closing his eyes, he surrendered to oblivion.
Chapter 2
Eyes darker than the midnight shade,
Teeth sharper than the headsman’s blade.
When he smiles, a cold wind blows Darkness comes where Nightfall goes.
– "The Legend of Nightfall"
Prince Edward Nargol wove through the garden pathways of Alyndar’s courtyard, too preoccupied to notice the buds of the first spring flowers poking through the dirt or the ever-present steward who chased him, huffing in his wake. Slavery. The evil inspired by the thought sent a shiver through him. His chest clenched in sympathy for the men and women forced to toil for moldy scraps unfit for hounds, driven to work beneath the broiling summer sun or shivering as frigid winds cut beneath their ragged clothing. Owned like animals. Beaten and cowed like wild asses broken to plow. No one deserves that. The last plot disappeared behind Edward’s ground-eating stride. He kept to the trail, headed for the main gate and its hovering, attentive retinue of guardsmen.
"My lord, wait. Please." The steward pleaded, his voice a wheeze.
Edward paused, giving the steward sufficient time to draw to his side. "Elfrit, it’s not necessary to follow me everywhere I go."
The slighter man stopped half a pace behind his prince. Sweat trickled from his gray-flecked, brown hair. "It’s my job, lord."
"Not for long, if you kill yourself doing it." Edward smiled. Elfrit had endured as prince’s steward for four months, longer than any other attendant since Edward had turned thirteen. "Here, I’ll give you the day free."
Elfrit adjusted his tabard, his breathing falling to a less painful-sounding pant. "And I thank you for your generosity. But, with all respect due, lord, I work for your father, not you.”
The prince laughed. "I hardly think my father would object to my giving my own steward some time to himself."
Elfrit’s cheek twitched as he suppressed an exclamation that Edward would never hear. He avoided the prince’s stare, hunched and concentrating on each slowing gasp.
Impatiently, Prince Edward smoothed his red satin shirt and tugged his patterned breeks into a more comfortable position. "Well?”
Elfrit straightened, his breaths normalizing. Pulling a handkerchief from his pocket, he wiped his brow, leaving spirals of hair plastered to his forehead. "Where are we going, lord?"
Resigned to Elfrit’s presence, Edward resumed his walk. "Out to do the king’s bidding?
“And that is, lord‘?" Elfrit broke into a trot so as not to fall behind again.
The gate loomed closer. The six guardsmen before it snapped to attention as the prince approached. On the wall above, the other two sentries crossed their halberds.
“To do something constructive outside his court, of course." Edward waved the guardsmen to an “at ease" position, "Open the gate."
Elfrit groaned almost inaudibly.
The nearest sentries seized the iron portals, pulling them open. A third crossed his wrists in a gesture of respect. "Prince Ned, we will escort you." He inclined his head toward the guardsman directly across from him who imitated the deferential motion.
"That won’t be necessary? Edward stepped past them and through the gates before the panels came fully open, Elfrit bundling after him.
Despite Edward’s instructions to the contrary, the pair of guardsmen trailed him through the opening.
The prince strutted across winter-barren ground studded with the earliest blades of grass. Ahead, sparse evergreens interrupted a farmer’s field, its irregular surface not yet plowed, its dirt boulders softening in the thaw. Just beyond sight of Alyndar’s castle, Edward knew he would find the Hartrinian camp.
Abruptly, he whirled on the guardsmen. "I told you, your presence is unnecessary.”
The sentries exchanged meaningful looks as their companions closed the gates behind them. "We insist, lord," the first one said.
"And I insist otherwise." Prince Edward had tired of the interference. In the past six months, the guards had trailed him like puppies. "Thank you for your concern, but I’d rather be alone." He glanced at Elfrit. "Or as alone as my too-loyal steward allows."
The guards hesitated, trading uncomfortable glances.
Prince Edward turned, continuing in the direction he had been walking. This time, the guards remained in place. Edward could hear their whispers, garbled to nonsense, until even the buzz of their conversation became lost beneath the hiss of wind-whipped needles.
Elfrit jogged along beside his prince. "Lord, don’t you think it might be wise to tell your father where we’re going?"
Prince Edward did not skip a pace. He entered a small cluster of pines that he knew sheltered the Hartrinians’ meadow camp. "Are you questioning me, Elfrit?"
That being clearly evident, Elfrit dodged the issue. “I’m only concerned for you, lord."
"Well, stop it." Edward threaded between the trees. "I’m quite capable of taking care of myself."
Elfrit muttered something unintelligible.
"What did you say?" Edward brushed through a brace of evergreens, the sight of the Hartrinian camp fully capturing his attention. Horses grazed piled hay, surrounding an array of tents. Smoke curled from the center of the camp, the fire obscured by the encircling canvas. A gaunt man in tattered homespun groomed a mare. A leather collar looped around the man’s neck, abraded skin showing scarlet above and below the band. As the horses’ questing noses flung hay to the ground, two other slaves raked it back into neat stacks. Otherwise, the prince saw no people.