A Hunger Most Dark novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: The Gate

Corwin Rooke stood in my front hall at dawn with a strongbox at his feet and his hat in his hands.

He was smiling, as he always was.

He had the Rooke looks, gold-brown hair and an easy mouth, and he had grown into the kind of handsome that makes strangers lend him money.

"Lord Ashkarr," he said. "Forgive the hour. I couldn't sleep, thinking of Len."

Gerrick stood at my shoulder and said nothing.

I had not slept either, and the cold sweat of the stairs was still drying under my shirt.

"State your business."

"Forty thousand crowns." He toed the strongbox. "The whole Rooke debt, in coin, paid in full. A friend in the river guilds stood surety for me."

"Which friend?"

"The Master of the Scales." Corwin's smile widened a little. "He was very upset about the dinner."

I looked at the box.

I had waited ten years for a day when Corwin Rooke could not pay.

He had found the one man in the city who hated me enough to lend him the money.

"Under Reckoning law," Corwin said, "a paid debt voids the surety. I'll take my sister home today."

"A named-term pledge can't be redeemed," Gerrick said flatly, "unless the pledged says yes."

Corwin turned his smile on my captain.

"Then we'll ask her."

"You'll ask me what?" said Lenore from the stairs.

She stood on the landing in her grey coat, fully dressed, with her hair pinned flat.

I had not heard her come up.

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