Fer vez Canthal accompanied one of Peggol’s men to the stables; the Eye and Ear obviously needed support against the ferocious, blood-crazed donkeys inside — that was what his body language said, anyhow. When Peggol ordered him out, he’d flinched as if told to invade Morgaf and bring back the king’s ears.

“You Eyes and Ears don’t often deal with matters outside the big cities, do you?” Radnal asked.

“You noticed that?” Peggol vez Menk raised a wry eyebrow. “You’re right; we’re urbanites to the core. Threats to the realm usually come among crowds of masking people. Most that don’t are a matter for the army, not us.”

Moblay Sopsirk’s son went over to the shelf where the war board was stored. “If we can’t go out today, Radnal, care for the game we didn’t have last night?”

“Maybe another time, freeman vez Sopsirk,” the tour guide said, turning Moblay’s name into its nearest Tarteshan equivalent. Maybe the brown man would take the hint and speak a bit more formally to him. But Moblay didn’t seem good at catching hints, as witness his advances toward Evillia and this even more poorly timed suggestion of a game. The Eye and Ear returned from the stable without the solution to Dokhnor’s death. By his low-voiced comments to his friends, he was glad he’d escaped the den of vicious beasts with his life. The Trench Park staffers tried to hide their sniggers. Even a few of the tourists, only two days better acquainted with donkeys than the Eye and Ear, chuckled at his alarm.

Something on the roof said hig-hig-hig! in a loud, strident voice. The Eye and Ear who’d braved the stables started nervously. Peggol vez Menk raised his eyebrow again. “What’s that, freeman vez Krobir?”

“A koprit bird,” Radnal said. “They hardly impale people on thornbushes.”

“No, eh? That’s good to hear.” Peggol’s dry cough served him for a laugh.