Swirls of mist and drizzled rain fell across the darkened streets of great Khefra Sur, City of Ten Thousand Sages, City of the Crimson River. Few there were abroad at that hour to mark the passage of two riders who horses trudged down muddy streets, the constant drip of water falling upon them from eaves and rooftops. The weather and the dark conspired to keep them indoors, where warmth and food and good drink called.

The foremost rider, a tall man with dark blonde hair that fell to his shoulders and a pale eyed gaze, brought his grey horse to a halt before a sprawling building of grey stone, from which swung a sign. Upon it was painted the emblem of a broken crown.

The man swung down from his horse, his cloak flowing aside to reveal a jacket of leather and a long bladed knife at his side. In his hand he held a stout wooden staff, capped with iron.

“This is the place?” asked the second, a woman atop a black mount. Her hair was dark, and long, and her face had a intense look to it. One hand held on to the reins of her horse, the second resting on the hilt of a long bladed sword sheathed from her saddle.

“I believe that to be so,” the man responded to her. “There can not be two such places that bear the same description, not even here in Khefra Sur.”

The woman dismounted, drawing her sword as she did, the blade sliding free with a shimmering note, an expectant edge. She wore a shirt of silvered scales that flowed as she moved, and her very carriage was that of one alert, eyes ever of the move, searching out trouble, her step light and poised.

She approached the door to the establishment and there paused, resting a hand upon the coarse wood that made it up.

“There is death here,” she announced, voice soft.

“Death is ever present in the cities of man,” her companion noted.

She shook her head, dark eyes narrowed as she concentrated. “This is recent, the blood still fresh.”

The man made no response; he knew better than to dismiss such pronouncements coming from one that followed Az-Ashar, the Lord of Death and the Desert Winds.

Sword at the ready, swift she kicked open the door and flowed within, as restless and alert as a wolf on the prowl, waiting not for the man to act in kind. Through the door, she entered a tavern room much as any other they had beheld; rushes were scattered upon the floor and around the room where crude made tables and benches, with a firepit in the centre. Lanterns hung from ceiling beams and a broad bench had been established at the rear of the room, where casks and bottles, pots and beakers sat at the ready.

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At an hour when their should have been a goodly crowd establish, drinking, singing and carousing, there was instead a silence. Five bodies lay strewn upon the flood, their blood soaking into the reeds, while at one of the tables a man sat, the only living soul to be seen. A tall and heavy set man, dark skinned and with a shaven head and an impressive beard, he sat back, booted feet propped up on the table before him, arms folded across his mail shirted chest. On the table before rested a long bladed broad sword, blood still fresh upon it, and a tankard of ale.

He smiled broadly as the woman darted in, coming to a halt at the sight of him.

“Ah, Ivkarha,” he said, voice full of mirth, dark eyes glinting in the lantern light. “I did wonder when you would show up. Where is your wild friend? Aedmorn, you can enter now. All is safe,” he called out.

Aedmorn appeared in the doorway, surveying the scene before him, brow furrowed, lips pursed. The coppery scent of fresh blood hung in the air and the bodies had not yet taken the pallor of death; they could have been alive but moments before they had arrived at the tavern.

“Why, Kato?” he asked simply. Ivkarha remained alert, sword at the ready, yet the big man, Kato, showed an indifference to it bordering on insolence.

His feet swung down and he picked up his tankard, causing Ivkarha to twitch, almost to the point of leaping forward; he did not even blink at it. Instead he tossed back the tankard and placed it down again.

“Set the sword aside, girl,” he said. “I mean you no harm, not bear you any enmity. I had a job to do, and so I did it.”

Ivkarha’s sword never dipped. “You were paid?”

“Of course,” he smiled. “I do not kill for no reason.”

“We had need of them.”

Kato shrugged his broad shoulders. “That can not be helped now.”

“Who paid you?” Ivkarha demanded.

A merry laugh came from Kato. “You know I can not tell you that. Who then would trust me in the future?”

“Then we are at an impasse,” Ivkarha told him, her dark eyes ablaze. “We can not let you leave until you do.”

Aedmorn scratched at his short beard and then shook his head with a sigh. “We can not afford him as a foe, Ivkarha,” he said softly. “Leave off.”

Ivkarha glanced aside but a moment to Aedmorn before returning her gaze to Kato. The big man remained where he sat, unarmed and impassive, unconcerned by events. It needled at her, that he showed them such disrespect, as if they were no real threat to him, even as they held all the advantages. “They were our last lead,” she retorted. “Without them we can not proceed. How do we not know for that reason it was that they were slain, to deny us that?”

“It is a worthy made point,” Kato stated.

Ivkhara’s brow twitched in surprise that he would agree with her in this. “Is it true then?”

“It is not, but a well made question none the less.” He sighed. “Come, join me for a drink, and let us talk like civilised people. There is no need for bloodshed.” He glanced to the dead laying around. “At least any more bloodshed.”

Finally Ivkarha’s sword dipped. “Do not think that it means I trust you.”

“I would be offended if you did,” laughed Kato. “The drinks are on me, and in the meantime you can tell me why these vermin were of such importance to you.”

“It is a long tale,” Aedmorn noted, entering the tavern at last.

“Then drink, and tell on.”