Chapter 17: Silver

Jorund did not scream.

He went down on his knees under the net with a grunt.

I will hear that sound until I die.

The smell of burning came up at once, the hot sour reek of silver on flesh.

"Cut it," Caelan shouted.

"Cut it off him!"

I ran at the net and caught a strand with my bare hand.

The silver bit me to the bone.

I did not let go.

Behind me, the line of guards surged forward over the stairs.

There were nineteen left, with their blades up and their faces set.

Behind them stood the Chancellor, with something white stuffed into both of his ears.

I understood why he had been so sure.

I had no reason left to hold anything back.

"Down!" I said.

The note came out of me the way it had in the clearing, deep and wide, and it rolled up the stairs.

Nineteen guards hit the stone at once.

Only the Chancellor stood, with wax in his ears, white-faced, his thin mouth moving.

I could not hear him.

I did not care.

He backed away through the arch with his hand on the wall and was gone.

Caelan reached me and tore the net up with his coat wrapped round his fists.

He swore as it burned through the cloth.

Together we dragged it off Jorund's shoulders and threw it in the straw.

Jorund lay on his side in the mud of the yard.

White weals crossed his back and arms and throat in a lattice, and the lattice was already going black at the edges.

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