"Tanya Huff - Death Rites" - читать интересную книгу автора (Huff Tanya)

Something had fallen into the well.

Something big.

There were more distant splashes. Smaller ones. As if someone had fallen and was struggling in the
water.

Marshal Arnon was scraping the bottom of the barrel as far as assassins were concerned. According to
Commander Jolan, there were two fifteen-year-olds left in the entire Seventh Army.

Sword drawn, he opened the door.

The lantern light spilled into the room and over the well. One of the capstones was missing and the one
next to it pulled out of line, the elongated print of wet fingers showing where the assassin had lost a
precarious grip. Grinning, he lifted the lantern and moved in for a closer look, but the well was too deep
for his light to reach the water and the splashing had stopped.

A pair of shadows dropped silently down from the ledge of the old arch and disappeared into the fortress.

The Emperor wanted the situation resolved, and his orders had been explicit.

But they had to find the commander before they could kill her.

The bureaucracy in the capital had spit forth a plan of the fortress. It hadn't included the well room, but
by the time Vree and Bannon reached the kitchens, they'd filled in the blanks. Skirting a pair of snoring
bodies, they made their way to a patch of deep shadow at one edge of the open wall and stared across the
courtyard. The Commander would be somewhere in the central tower.

While they'd been moving through the hill, the nearly full moon had dropped low in the sky, creating
bars of light and dark between the buildings. Assassins' paths.

Useful. But they'd still have to waste time searching the tower. The search had likely killed Ganit. The
longer it took to reach a target, the greater the odds of discovery.

Together? Bannon signed, looking annoyed.

Vree nodded. They'd lose most of the advantage they had over the previous three assassins if they
separated.

They were about to move from kitchen to tower when a shadow separated from the top of the gatehouse.
Then a second. Then a third. The three huge birds landed side by side, with no sound from feathers or

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daws, on a window ledge almost exactly halfway up the tower wall.