The man swallowed with a grimace as if it pained him. “I did betray you, though. I would have. I was.”

Havec looked at him and said nothing.

“I didn’t mean this is your doing, I brought it on myself.” He paused to gasp in pain. “I was standing in the path of your revenge. That isn’t something the principal servant of vengeance can get away with. Our bargain…”

“Never stipulated conditions for its end,” he said slowly.

Xar laughed bitterly. “Learned to read the fine print since then, eh?”

“Xar,” he began, but his voice broke and he cleared his throat, furious this had happened.

“Ah, boy,” his master said sadly, “you never once used my name in all these years, don’t stop raging against me now.” Havec had never, never wanted to kill him as badly as he did when their eyes met and he saw that the man understood how he felt. “You’re ready. You have been for a year.”

He drew in a deep breath, suddenly uncertain.

“You may not be sure,” his master said, reading his mind again, “but I am. I’ve known for a while. I just couldn’t bring myself to tell you because I didn’t want to let you go.”

He reached for him, and Havec jerked back. The man sank a hand into the hair at the back of his skull, and even moments from death, his strength was such that Havec couldn’t pull away. “Come here,” he said hoarsely. “It is ended and you are free, but there is one more thing that has to happen before the bargain is sealed.”

With his vast inexorable strength, he drew Havec in until he was close enough to kiss. The second their lips touched, something passed between them. A sensation of hunger and hot tears and cold rage. Biding. Demanding. Dizzy with obsession and meticulous as an accountant’s books. Then, as if the essence of his power and the last of his life had been entwined, Xaritu anKebbal sighed his last breath and fell away from Havec’s mouth.

As the man slumped back and settled to his side, Havec was left staring in sightless astonishment at the wood of the desk, examining the whorls with drunken fascination. He had known his master meant to do that. Sort of. In a sense. But when it came, it had been completely unexpected.

He sat up a little straighter, putting his shoulders back and drawing in a deep breath as he wondered what it would be like. It wasn’t anything he would have wanted, given a choice, but when had Xar ever given him a real choice about anything? He would like to leave this place behind entirely, but he would be carrying their blood-tainted mysticism with him. That felt appropriate, and letting out one final tiny sigh, he pushed himself to his feet.

“What will we do?”

He had forgotten about that girl and turned to stare at her. Her mahogany skin had gone an unpleasant gray hue, and her face was ashen where tears had stained her cheeks. He had less than no interest in what became of her, but leaving her here in the midst of this abattoir seemed cruel.

Stooping to grab his sword, he told her, “We probably don’t want to stick around, there might be more of them.”

“What were they after?”

He shook his head as he went to join her in the doorway.

“Shouldn’t we tell someone?”

He looked at her incredulously. “I’m a foreigner without papers and you’re one of your people’s lower class, otherwise known as untrustworthy human trash. Right?”

She nodded, too shocked to be insulted.

“We’re the only ones left alive over the corpse of a great man. I’m not sticking around to answer questions.”

She didn’t argue that, either, hastening after him once he edged past her and set off down the hall. “What should I do?”

“Go up to your room. Pack your shit in your bag. Wait there two minutes, I’ll be right on your heels.”

He gestured forcefully down the hallway, and the girl was too rattled to do anything other than obey.

***

The instant Qanath was alone in the bloody, badly-lit darkness, the fear returned. She wasn’t sure whether it had been more brave or foolish to get out of bed and investigate when she heard the disturbance; it was just the kind of thing you did. This, though, this was like something from a terrible dream or the kind of scary bedside story your Fa told you as a kid if you were lucky. Things like this didn’t happen in real life.

She was deeply glad she had the barbarian to tell her what to do. He was only two or maybe three years older than her, but right now what mattered was that he was calm and purposeful and knew how to handle a sword. The way he came flying out of nowhere to save her… That was like something out of a story, too. She would be dead if not for him, and if there was some sensible way to feel about that, she didn’t know what it was.

Maybe she should have suspected, though, she told herself as she reached the foot of the stair and began to climb. This was a school for the martial arts, and there was a way in which it was a temple. He would have been bound to pick things up. She should have guessed as much when he slapped her. He moved like an asp, so fast she hadn’t seen it, and yet he hadn’t hit her all that hard. It hadn’t been an attack but a warning not to disrespect him, and he had the control to make that point without breaking her jaw.

She ascended into darkness, and as the night closed around her like water, it carried with it an almost ungovernable dread. Anyone could be hiding up here. They could be watching her right now. She had been here for a matter of days and she had done nothing, learned nothing, she was weak and helpless and assassins could be watching her from the darkness at that moment.

She wanted to turn around and run back down the stairs, but the barbarian was down there. She could imagine the look on his face if she did. He was a barbarian bed bonded, and she was the daughter of a Senator, but he would sneer at her and all of that would mean nothing. She forced herself to walk at a measured pace to her room, although her bones seemed to vibrate as her will and body warred between themselves.

Within her room, she fell to the floor and crawled to the dresser, where she crammed her few possessions with frantic haste into her bag. The instant this was done, a new fear beset her: there was no love lost between them, what if he had sent her up here to pack while he walked out the door? He had called her human garbage not twenty minutes ago, and he still seemed to think this might all be her fault.

This fear turned out to be unworthy: she had barely managed to whip up a proper panic when she heard his familiar footfalls on the stairs. No one moved like Havec, soft-footed as a cat yet strutting arrogantly. She could almost hear the jingle of the bells he wasn’t wearing. She scrambled to her feet and made it to the door in time to see him emerge through the floor.

He had a lantern in hand and carried a small sack that was already filled. When his eyes found her, he gave her a nod. He moved past her, continuing upward, and didn’t protest when she fell in at his heels. She couldn’t bear to be alone again, especially not in the dark.

They climbed to the top of the tower, which turned out to be one gigantic room. As the barbarian lit a few lights, it was revealed, windows looking out in every direction, their curtains dancing in a warm wind. A large bed stood near the far wall, covers disturbed, but it didn’t really register that this was his room until he went to the dresser and began pulling out clothes.

Most of it, he stuffed in a pack, but he did pull a shirt on and traded his knickers for a pair of long pants. Properly dressed for the first time since she met him, he seemed a different person, more relatable perhaps, but also more intimidating. He wasn’t her teacher’s temperamental pet, he was a tall and handsome foreigner.

A pair of boots stood upright beside the dresser, and he pulled them on. When he straightened, he seemed arrested by something on the dresser’s top and reached out before going still. The tableau held for a span of seconds, then he turned away decisively. As he passed her, he gestured behind him. “Feel free to raid my jewelry, it sounds like your family could use the cash.”

“You don’t want it? For sentimental reasons, if nothing else?”

“These are the memories I’ll take with me,” he murmured.

Qanath didn’t turn around to find out what he meant. She had drawn close enough to the dresser to see what lay on its top and been sucked in. There was a fortune in jewelry just lying there for the taking, and he was right that her family could use the money. She reached out and hesitated, too, uncertain. Then she made her hand move forward and close around a fistful of chains of gold and silver, which she shoved in her bag.

When she did turn around, she found the barbarian walking a circle of the lone pillar supporting the roof high above. It was covered in weapons like a candy tree at a children’s festival. She took in flails and whips scattered amongst swords, axes, bows, along with half a hundred other weapons with names unknown to her.

Her companion was busy weighing himself down with an arsenal. He had a knife and two swords at his hips, and now slung a cased bow across his back, reaching next for a quiver. “Feel free to take anything you want. All of this is mine now, so I give you permission or whatever.”

She had no desire to take a weapon, but his words felt like a challenge. She grabbed a staff as tall as she was, thin and graceful, and more importantly, neither metal nor edged. She had seen enough blood tonight to last her a lifetime.

It had hung from the pillar by a leather strap that made it easy to sling across her back. When he saw that she was ready, the barbarian nodded toward the stairs. Together, they made their way down through the bodies and out into the night. Then he turned left and set off walking briskly into the middle of a grassy field.

Qanath stared, uncertain, before hurrying after him. “Are we not going to use the road, is it too dangerous?”

He stopped, and she felt his sidelong gaze. It was a moment before he said, very casually, “Why don’t you lead the way?”

She had no idea why he had suggested this but had no desire to argue. Not out here in the night with the wind blowing, the shifting shadows even more peopled by assassins than the blood-soaked building they just quit. She would do anything it took not to rile his restive temper.

She led them to the road, and together, they made their way into the night.

A Bargain Isn’t Struck

They walked through the darkness for a period that felt far too long right up until the barbarian called a halt, at which point Qanath worried they hadn’t traveled far enough. They made a cold camp in a copse of pines between the road and the line of hills that had begun to rise off to their right. Neither of them slept, tossing fitfully while they stared into the night. She didn’t think she was the only one seeing ghosts.