“And the assassin? What had he to say for himself?”

“Yoseff was never one for conversation,” Arilyn said shortly.

“Ah. And he is dead, I suppose?”

“Very. He carried a few things that might help, though.” Arilyn reached into the bag that hung from her belt and took several glittering objects from it. The first to catch Danilo’s eye was a finely wrought gold locket on a heavy gold chain. A very nice amethyst-brilliant cut, thumb-sized, and deep purple in hue-was set into the front of the locket and a wisp of fine, black hair was nestled within.

“An amulet of seeking,” he surmised, fingering the soft curl. “Hair so soft could only have belonged to an elf or a baby. I’m guessing the latter. So we not only have a fair idea who the assassin came to find, but also who sent him-may all the gods damn the woman who would so use her own child!”

Before he could elaborate, a female voice, raised in a keening wail, cut through the night. It was a chilling sound, an ages old, wordless song of mourning. It spoke of death more clearly than any cleric’s eulogy, and far more poignantly.

Arilyn bolted from the stable with Danilo close behind her. They dashed through the nearly empty hail, toward the babble of gnomish voices in a side chamber. A thick-chested gnome barred their way. He was an odd-looking fellow with hair and skin of nearly matching shades of slate gray. Danilo recognized him from descriptions as Garith Hunterstock, Bentley’s second-in-command, Though the gnomish commander was determined to keep them out, the Harpers were tall enough to see over the heads of the crowd.

In the room beyond, Bentley Mirrorshade lay in a spreading pool of blood. The hilt of a jeweled dagger rose from his chest.