The iron portcullises slammed into the canal floor with a bone-shaking boom that sent sheets of black water cascading twenty feet into the air.
Ahead, the Three-Fork Lock narrowed into an artificial stone canyon sixty paces wide, framed by forty-foot stonework towers and heavy with rusted iron ties.
High on the central low roof wall, a man stepped forward to the stone crenellations.
He was broad-shouldered and lean, dressed in black layered-scale armor beneath a royal silk surcoat stitched with the white crane of the Ministry of Sacrifices.
At his hip hung a heavy bone-carving saber, its sword sheath wrapped in dried sharkskin.
His facial features—harsh cheekbones, narrow hungry eyes, and a thin scar across the bridge of his nose—bore a clear resemblance to the dead commander of the northern pass.
Squad Leader Meng leaned his gauntleted hands against the wet stone low roof wall. It looked down into the narrow lock where Lu Chen stood alone.
“You have northern mud on your boots,” Meng called out. His voice was sharp and metal against the stone walls. “The courier hawks from Weeping Pass fly fast. Meng Guan was my cousin. You burned his bones to cinders and tossed his ashes into the snow.”
