“Remember it? I wish I could forget! ‘He came at me from the shadows, on four legs, then on two. He howled like some kind of wild dog, and he was covered in moon-lit fur. He jumped on me before I could even think to move. Please tell my Da that I love him, and I’m sorry.’ ” He repeated the last part, softly. “I’m sorry. Oh, Mikal.” He put his head in his arms and wept.
Andri motioned to Irulan and they rose, not disturbing the grieving man. Andri left a handful of galifars on the table, not even bothering to count them. It was little enough to repay the man for his trouble, but it was all he could do.
Outside the tavern, Irulan turned to him.
“What now?”
“We’ve spoken to all the families and witnesses that we can. Even a writ from the Keeper herself isn’t likely to persuade those who don’t worship the Flame to help us, so that leaves the accused. And the camp shifters.”
“Good luck,” Irulan snorted.
“What do you mean?” Andri asked.
The camp shifters. They won’t tell me anything, and I live there. They don’t trust anyone who follows the Flame, so what makes you think they’re going to talk to you? And why do you need to talk to them, anyway? They haven’t done anything.”
“Perhaps not, but if someone is trying to frame shifters in order to destroy them or drive them away, then maybe somebody within the shifter community knows why.”
Irulan nodded. “Well, that makes sense.”
“I’m glad you agree,” Andri replied, trying to keep the irony from his tone. By the look Irulan gave him, he didn’t quite succeed. “We’ll go to the camp first, I think.”
“Why not the prisoners?”
He shrugged. “They’re not going anywhere.”
When they reached Silver Way, Aruldusk’s main thoroughfare, Andri bid Irulan a good evening. He planned on attending Mass at the Cathedral, but she would be celebrating outside the city, where a priest of the Flame offered Mass in a borrowed tent near the livestock pens. Understandably, those few shifters who, like Irulan, followed the Silver Flame, no longer felt safe worshipping within the city walls.
Before he could turn away, she reached out and grabbed his arm.
“It wasn’t a shifter from Aruldusk who killed that boy,” she said, and Andri could see she was spoiling for an argument. He cut her off.
“I know.”
“How?” she asked, seemingly put off by his easy acquiescence.
“Mikal mentioned ‘moon-lit fur.’ How could it be moon-lit if he was in the shadows? I think he meant white fur, like the sample you brought to Flamekeep.”
“So you think we’re looking for a shifter with white fur? You might find one in colder places, but here, on Khorvaire? That coloring would make him-or her-stand out like a Karrn necromancer at High Mass.”
Andri cracked a smile at the comparison, even though it was more than a little sacrilegious. Though there were some Karrns who did worship the Flame, they were few and far between-and as likely to bring their blunt, loud ways to their worship as to everything else they did. It was an apt analogy. One that applied as well to the straightforward shifter, though he doubted she’d appreciate the parallels.
“Mikal also said his attacker was covered in fur. The only way he could have known that was if whoever attacked him wasn’t wearing clothes.”
“Shifters don’t normally run around town naked,” Irulan said, smiling wryly in spite of herself. “Most of us, anyway.”
“No,” Andri agreed. “Plus he said it walked first on four legs, then on two. That doesn’t sound like a shifter to me.”
“So now you’re thinking some sort of animal?” Irulan asked. “One that looks like a shifter-or possibly a large dog, or wolf-walks on both four legs and two, and is smart enough to roam around the city for months killing people without getting caught? What kind of animal …?”
Irulan trailed off, her dark eyes widening with realization.
There was one animal-if you could call it that-which fit the description. Andri didn’t want to believe it could be true, didn’t want to confront the dark memories conjured by the mere notion, but duty compelled him to face the possibility that they were hunting something far more dangerous than any shifter.
“Oh, Flame,” Irulan whispered, and Andri nodded.
“A lycanthrope.”
Chapter SIX
Sar, Therendor 21, 998 YK
Greddark stepped off the rail cart and onto the boarding platform, pausing to take a deep breath. The station vendors were serving beef, but it was overspiced and overcooked, probably to disguise the fact that it had started out tough and stringy before it ever hit their grills. A new issue of the Inquisitive was available at the chronicle stand-the acrid smell of fresh ink accented the fragrance of cooking meat, and not in a pleasant way.
“Ah,” Zoden said beside him, taking in large lungfuls of air. “The welcoming aromas of Aruldusk! Probably seems a bit bland to you after living in the Court of Leaves.”
“Not exactly,” Greddark replied.
They’d spent a few days in Sigilstar waiting for the furor from Zoden’s encounter to die down before boarding the rail again. While the bard had bathed during that time, he hadn’t gotten his clothing laundered, and he still smelled vaguely of Frostmantle Fire and old sweat. Combined in Greddark’s sensitive nose with the other odors, the scent was anything but bland. Noxious was more like it.
He pulled out a map from one of the interior pockets of his long coat. Finding what he was looking for, he stepped off the platform, heading west along Silver Way.
“Wait! Where are we going?”
“I’m going to the Cathedral, to speak to a … friend. You are going to go home and lock yourself in until I come to get you. And change your clothes, while you’re at it. I’m not even a shifter and I could track you through town with my eyes closed.”
“What?” The bard bristled, though whether it was because of Greddark’s order or his insult, the inquisitive couldn’t tell. Probably both. “There’s no way I’m going to hide out at home while you go and solve the whole mystery without me!”
Greddark figured he’d better put a stop to this foolishness right now. Curiosity did not an inquisitive make, and the sooner Zoden found that out, the better his chances of surviving this whole affair would be.
“Seems to me hiding out is one of the things you do best,” he pointed out. At Zoden’s crestfallen look, he added, “It’s for your own safety. As far as we know, you’re the only person still living who has witnessed one of these murders. Frankly, you’d have been better off staying in Sigilstar. Or Flamekeep.”
“Why? It’s not as if I’d be any safer there. They found me on the rail, didn’t they?”
“Be that as it may, you are safer behind locked doors. And there are a few House Kundarak charms I can use to make you even more secure, after I finish up at the Cathedral.”
“And how do you think you’re going to get into the Cathedral without me?”
Greddark blinked. “Walk in?”
“Nobody just walks into the Cathedral … at least, not if you aren’t a worshipper of the Silver Flame. They’d be politely escorting you out-probably by sword point-before you could figure out what direction to kneel in and which knee is supposed to go down first.”
The dwarf grunted. “Funny, I hadn’t pegged you as a Flamer.”
Zoden gave a sardonic laugh.
“I’m not. The only flame I find worthy of veneration is the one that cooks my food and warms my hearth. But I’ve lived in Thrane my whole life, and I know how to play the part. Do you?”
Damn. The silly git had a point.
“Fine. You can come with me, and I’ll follow your lead in the Cathedral, but once we get to where we’re going, I’ll do the talking. Understood?”