[center][i]Who pursues wealth pursues death disguised.[/i]
- from the [i]Collected Teachings[/i] of Dagomund, Prophet of the Only God
[/center]

[b][i]Months previous, just north of the Chain of Fire, the open ocean...[/i][/b]

Snow was falling, big wet flakes that formed an icy brine as they mixed with the thin layer of sea water sloshing across the deck of the [i]Lady Alma[/i]. The ocean heaved like a thing alive, the prow of the ship plunging down the back of the rolling green water only to smack into the oncoming wave in an explosion of freezing white spray.

It was the height of summer. 

Not for the first time on this voyage, Gazid thought of home. Zar Dratha would be a steaming oven now, the city sluggish and silent by day, the endless grub-paddies beyond the walls shimmering like broken glass in the glare of the angry sun.

Not that Gazid cared overmuch what the weather did- for what he was being paid the Coward could lead him into the fifteen hells the Dagomun preachers warned so much about. If he survived this stint in the Broken Lands, Gazid would go home a very rich man with some very powerful friends. The Coward had quite a few allies in the South, among the Masters. Allies who wanted him to succeed in his native country.

Still, he drew his cloak about him more tightly and took a swig of Dalean brandy from a dented flask, relishing the liquor's burning warmth. The helmsman, one hand on the wheel, held the other out for a taste and Gazid shrugged and handed over the booze. Always paid to have friends on a ship like this-though he didn't know how sauced he wanted the man guiding the boat through these kind of waves...

Gazid took back his flask, took another swig, and cast his gaze over the deck before him. Sailors, a mix of Varyonese and Broken Landers, bustled everywhere, shouting orders and '[i]ayes![/i]' over the roar of the water.

The Coward himself was leaning against the mizzenmast, his gaunt face blank and unreadable, black hair flying in the wind. He seemed indifferent to the roiling ocean beneath him. Knife in hand, he peeled an orange as he spoke to his two favorite cronies. Gazid knew them well enough: Vilmar the Grim, Daigon's right hand, a hardened grey-beard and soldier, looking pretty green on the open sea; and Half Face, a hulking aelgman, the left side of his face burned down to the skull, giving him a permanent, lopsided rictus.

Gazid couldn't hear what they were saying, probably talk of Broken Lander politics. A topic about which he didn't need too many details- just the Coward to tell him who to frighten, who to kill, and when to do it. 

[center][b]-[/b]

[i]Her blessings are many, her price is always the same.[/i]
- greeting given to one another by initiates of the Quiet Sisters[/center]

[b][i]Weeks previous, Sepulchrave...[/i][/b]

She stood at the end of the stone pier, dressed in crimson and white, her robes billowing in the sea wind. She was beautiful, with fair hair and fairer skin, blue eyes and a knowing smile that had driven more than a few men to make dangerous mistakes. 

She looked like a young woman, no more than twenty five. But she was not a young woman.

The Jarl's ship loomed high above her, too large a ship for Sepulchrave's docks. Sailors above shouted at one another in a mongrel mix of tongues as they cast down ropes and struggled to secure the massive vessel to the crumbling stone quay. They succeeded, eventually, and the gangplank dropped with a slam.

Daigon, her husband, was the first off the ship, axe at his side and broadsword across his back. He came to her, seized her arms with subdued violence and kissed her, and she remembered why she loved this man she had hardly seen for the better part of two decades.

He had come back, since the Stonefoot had ordered him away, three times to her, traveling anonymously on merchant vessels. Once he had stayed in Sepulchrave, no one knowing but her, for five months.

While he was in the south, they had kept in touch continuously through letters carried by traveling members of her Order. The Quiet Sisters had a large priory in Zar Dratha and several smaller ones throughout the southlands.

Even so, he had been a long time in exile, and Daigon had no heir. She suggested they work on that when he was finished kissing her.

He smiled, "There will be time for that," he said. Years in the ash deserts had turned his voice into a soft rasp, "Now is the time for other things."

She looked behind him, saw his men unloading from the ship. Three were already on the pier, approaching the Jarl and his wife. Vilmar she knew, and she recognized the scarred aelgmen Daigon had spoken of in his letters- a fierce warrior saved from the Salished priests and their hungry gods. The third she did not recognize, a dark-skinned Varyonese in black robes, his hands covered in swirling blue tattoos. She could read Drathan, had studied it in the Priory, and so she knew those markings were more than ornaments.

"Cythlla," said Daigon, "I must away, but briefly this time. While I am gone, I need you to do something."

"Anything."

"Call the banners."

She said nothing.

"Vilmar and the aelg will stay here, in command of the Coward's Men. But I will need all the Shattered Moon, and you must call them."

"The other, he is one of the Congress' assassins, is he not? One of the Subtle Instruments?"

As though he had heard, the man in the black robes approached and bowed to Cythlla. 

"I am Gazid," he said in accented norse, "honored to be a guest in your lands, my lady."

"Honored to have you," she replied, in High Drathan. The assassin raised an eye brow and said nothing.

"I am going to Kingsport," said Daigon, "with him."