Page 17 of Shadows of Winter

She gripped the bars, shifting her weight off Frayvar as much as she could as she peered out. Finally, she could see.

Twilight had fallen, but streetlamps burned along the road, a canal that passed the jail, and a bridge that was… half missing. Rubble littered the cobblestones on one side, and men fought on the half of it that was still intact. That could not be a stable perch.

Kaylina shook her head grimly. The rangers had marched her and Frayvar over that bridge on the way to the jail. What if the explosion—had it been a keg of black powder?—had gone off when they’d been on it?

Two of the fighting figures wore black—Targon and Vlerion. They crouched back to back at the base of the bridge, not ten yards away from the jail. Men and a few women in a hodgepodge of chain mail, leather armor, and rusty plate—the pieces were mixed as if they’d been selected at random—attacked the rangers with swords and cudgels.

Three archers and a woman who was reloading a single-round blunderbuss stood farther down the canal, using a lamppost and a tree for cover while leaning out to fire at the rangers.

A war horn rang out somewhere in the city. A warning to desist. The attackers did not.

“For the righteous and virtuous!” someone bellowed. “For the commoners!”

Another archer stood at the corner of the jail building. He fired not at the rangers but at the other bowmen. An ally for Vlerion and Targon. But someone in black clothing with a knife crawled out of the canal—was there a boat down there?—and crept through the shadows toward the archer.

Kaylina bit her lip, not certain if she should call a warning or not. On the one hand, rangers were law enforcers in the kingdom, as well as defenders of its borders, and she should have felt loyal to them. On the other, Targon and Vlerion hadn’t given her any reason to love them, and if this was a class battle, she didn’t want to side with the aristocrats. There wasn’t a drop of noble blood in her veins. Besides, the aristocrats had advantages enough.

But they were outnumbered in this battle…

More men with knives climbed out of the canal. They glanced at the fight at the base of the bridge, then headed for the jail instead.

Given the number of enemies, the rangers should have gone down quickly, but they had the better training. Far better training.

Kaylina stared as Vlerion somehow sensed an arrow zipping toward his head and deflected it with his sword at the same time as he used a dagger to parry an attacker’s cudgel. Not glancing at the archer, he kicked the closer foe back and spun to his side to protect Targon from another swordsman.

His movements were so fast that they blurred, making them hard to follow. Targon was competent as well, extremely competent, but he didn’t have the same preternatural speed as Vlerion. Far greater speed and grace than Kaylina would have expected from a big man. Something about the way Vlerion moved his feet and whipped his limbs about, blocking every attack and deploying several of his own, made her think of panthers chasing prey in the reeds along the marshy shoreline back home. He didn’t seem quite… human.

She snorted at herself. What else could he be? Half Kar’ruk? He didn’t have horns and fangs.

Further, Vlerion’s face wasn’t savage as he fought. No, it was the opposite. Enough light came from a lamp burning at the base of the bridge for her to see his expression. He looked like he was concentrating, his focus absolute. No battle lust burned in his eyes, nor did he show any sign of fear or anger or aggression of any kind. His lack of reaction in the face of his enraged foes was strange. The words not quite human came to mind again.

In contrast, Targon grunted, cursed, and let out a triumphant, “Got you!” as he took down an opponent in front of him.

The rangers were frustrating their attackers, who snarled, spat, and maligned aristocrats as they swung their weapons. As their numbers diminished, their blows grew more desperate. Kaylina couldn’t believe they were still attacking. They had to realize that, even with archers trying to pepper the rangers, they weren’t going to win. One man kept glancing toward the jail, as if expecting something to happen there.

Those glances cost him his life. Vlerion swung his sword horizontally and took off his head.

Kaylina swore as it thudded to the ground and rolled into the canal. Again, she reminded herself not to insult Vlerion.

A barge floated down the river toward the destroyed bridge, and she imagined the crew being confused—and horrified—as a head bumped against their hull.

Several of them were out on deck, watching the battle. No, they were fiddling with a large rectangular object on the deck, something taller than they. Was that a cage? Yes, a black animal moved inside. Something bigger than the panther she’d been imagining. A cragwalker? A bearslayer? A trained yekizar? Some deadly animal she’d only read about in books, that was certain.

Frayvar groaned and shifted. “How much longer do you need a front-row seat to whatever is happening out there?”

“Another minute. I think that barge is part of it.” Biceps and forearms quivering, Kaylina pulled herself higher, pressing her face to the bars for a better view.

A clang sounded as the cage door opened, slamming to the deck. With a lion-like roar, the muscled black creature ran out and sprang for the street—for the battle. A yekizar.

On powerful limbs, it bounded toward the fray, its golden eyes catching the lamplight. They were focused not randomly on the crowd but on the rangers.

A chill swept through Kaylina. Her books had never spoken of that kind of intelligence in the beasts of the north, that they could recognize and choose their prey.

Different roars sounded in the distance, from the same direction that horn had been blown. Those she’d heard before. Taybarri.

More rangers had to be coming to help, but would they be in time? The yekizar might be too much even for Vlerion.

He glanced toward it as he knocked two attackers away, one gripping his bleeding side as he stumbled and fell into the canal. That made room for Vlerion to spring out of the knot of men, landing in a crouch facing the approaching beast. Again, his face was impassive. Eerily calm.

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