The matching war hammer lay tossed upon the rumpled bed. Its claw-rimmed iron head-very like an animal's paw-was smeared with dried gore like the blotch on the rug. Ingrey measured it against his palm, noted the congruity with the wounds he had just seen. The hammer had been swung two-handed, with all the strength that terror might lend. But only a woman's strength, after all. The prince, half-stunned-half-mad?-had apparently kept coming. The second blow had been harder.
Ingrey strolled the length of the room, looking all around and then up at the beams. Ulkra, hands clutching one another, backed out of his way. Just above the bed dangled a frayed length of red cord. Ingrey stepped up on the bed frame, drew his belt knife, stretched upward, cut it through, and tucked the coil away in his jerkin. He jumped down and turned to the hovering Ulkra. “Boleso is to be buried at Easthome. Have his wounds and his body washed-more thoroughly-and pack him in salt for transport. Find a cart, a team-better hitch two pairs, with the mud on the roads-and a competent driver. Set the prince's guards as outriders; their ineptitude can do him no more harm now. Clean this room, set the keep to rights, appoint a caretaker, and follow on with the rest of his household and valuables.” Ingrey's gaze drifted around the chamber. Nothing else here…“Burn the leopard. Scatter its ashes.”
Should he and his captive travel with the slow cortege, or push on ahead? He wanted to be away from this place as swiftly as he could-it made his neck muscles ache-but the light was shortening with autumn's advent, and the day was half-spent already. “I must speak to the prisoner before I decide. Take me to her.”
It was a brief step, down one floor to a windowless, but dry, storeroom. Not dungeon, certainly not guest room, the choice of