Blood of the Fold

"Thank you. Mistress Sanderhoit. I know she'll be heartened to hear that not everyone turned against her and the Midlands. But don't give up hope. As long as the Midlands lives on in our hearts, there is hope. We will prevail. 1

She smiled, but in the depths of her eyes he could see for the first time into the core of her despair. She didn't believe him. Life under the Order, brief as it had been, had been brutal enough to extinguish even the spark of hope; that was why she hadn't bothered to leave Aydindril. Where was there to go?

Richard retrieved his sword from the snow and wiped its gleaming blade clean on a mriswith's hide clothes. He drove the sword home into its scabbard.

They both turned at the sound of nervous whispers to see a crowd of kitchen workers gathered near the top of the steps, staring incredulously at the carnage in the snow, and at Gratch. One man had picked up one of the three-bladed knives, and was turning it over, examining it. Fearing to come down the steps, near Gratch, he insistently motioned for Mistress Sanderholt's attention. She gestured irritably, urging him to come to her.

He appeared to be hunched more from a life of hard labor than from age, though his thinning hair was graying. He descended the steps with a rolling gait as if carrying a heavy sack of grain on his rounded shoulders. He bobbed a quick bow by deference to Mistress Sanderhoit as his gaze flicked from her, to the bodies, to Gratch, to Richard, and back again to her.

"What is it, Hank?"

"Trouble, Mistress Sanderhoit."

"I'm a little busy, at the moment, with trouble of my own. Can't all you people pull bread from the ovens without me there?"

His head bobbed. "Yes, Mistress Sanderhoit. But this is trouble about — " He glared at a reeking mriswiih carcass lying nearby. "—about these things."

Richard straightened. "What about them?"

Hank glanced lo the sword at his hip, and then diverted his eyes. "I think it was…" When he looked up at Gratch, and the gar smiled, the man lost his voice.

"Hank, look at me." Richard waited until he complied. "The gar won't hurt you. These things are called mriswith. Gratch and I are the ones who killed them. Now tell me about the trouble."

He scrubbed the palms of his hands on his wool trousers. "I looked at their knives, at those three blades they have. That appears to be what did it." His expression darkened. "The news is spreading on a near panic. People have been killed. Thing is, no one saw what done it. Those killed all had their bellies slit open by something with three blades."

With an anguished sigh, Richard wiped a hand across his face. "That's the way mriswith kill; they disembowel their victims, and you can't even see them coming. where were these people killed?1

"All over the city, at about the same time, right at first light. From what I heard, I reckon it had to be separate killers. By the number of these mriswith things I'd wager I'm right. The dead mark lines, like the spokes of a wheel, all leading here.

"They killed whoever was in their way. men, women, even horses. The troops are in an uproar, as some of their men got it, too, and the rest seem to think its an attack of some sort. One of these mriswith things went right through the crowd gathered out in the street. The bastard didn't bother to step around, just slashed his way right through the middle." Hank cast a sorrowful glance to Mistress Sanderholt. "One came through the palace. Killed a maid, two guards, and Jocelyn."

Mistress Sanderholt gasped and covered her mouth with a bandaged hand. Her eyes slid closed as she whispered a prayer.

"I'm sorry. Mistress Sanderholt, but I don't think Jocelyn suffered; I got to her right away, and she was already gone."

"Anyone else of the kitchen staff?"

"Just Jocelyn. She was on an errand, not in the kitchens."

Gratch silently eyed Richard as he glanced up the mountain, at the stone walls. The snow above was flushed pink in the dawn light. He pursed his lips in frustration as he looked out over the city again, bile raising in his throat.

"Hank."

"Sir?"

Richard turned back. "I want you to get some men. Carry the mriswith out in front of the palace and line them up along the grand entrance. Get it done now, before they freeze solid." The muscles in his jaw stood out as he ground his teeth. "Put the loose heads on pikes. Line them up nice and neat, on each side, so than anyone entering the palace has to walk between them." " ~

Hank cleared his throat, as if about to protest, but then he glanced to the sword at Richard's hip and instead said, "At once, sir." He bobbed his head to Mistress Sanderholt and rushed to the palace to get help.

"The mriswith must have magic. Maybe the fear of it will at least keep the D'Harans from the palace for a while."

Worry lines creased her brow. "Richard, as you say, apparently these creatures had magic. Can anyone but you see these snake men when they're sneaking up, changing color?"