A shout broke through the river mist near the south palisade, followed by the sharp, metallic snap of a crossbow being cranked to full draw. It was a harsh, ugly sound that tore through the evening quiet of South Lane, bringing Jon Hale out of the stable alley at a dead run, with Alden Bram thumping heavily behind him, his ash cane splashing through the muddy puddles.
They rounded the corner of the tannery sheds, where the stone wall gave way to the twenty-foot timber palisade that guarded the dry ditch.
Four lanterns hung from the catwalk braces, casting a greasy yellow glare over the wet grass of the embankment. Captain Dain stood with his boots planted on the berm, his garrison broadsword drawn, backed by three watchmen whose notched crossbows were leveled directly at a solitary figure huddled at the bottom of the scarp.
The intruder knelt in the ditch silt, wrapped in a sodden, tattered cloak of ash-gray wool—the uniform cloth of the Ash Host’s vanguard scouts. Her dark leather breeches were caked with river mud to the hips, and the left shoulder of her buff jerkin was shredded into bloody ribbons where pursuit mastiffs had torn through the boiled hide. Beside her in the weeds lay two empty leather pouches that smelled of sulfurous heat-chalk, a broken sighting quadrant, and a brass compass with a cracked crystal.
