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Dal squinted, and counted half a dozen. A quick glance at the sky showed no sign of dragonfly-riders up there, nor had there been time for cavalry to come all the way from Leose itself. This must be some band of Mercers who happened to be in the area, perhaps investigating Dal’s earlier misdeeds.

He kicked off from the roof and landed in the village’s heart, surrounded by the collapsing skeletons of houses and a flurry of glowing embers. ‘Get it stowed right away. They’re coming!’ he shouted, and his people, new and old, doubled their pace, practically throwing everything on to the barge. The draught-nymph was already in place ready to drag the bulky craft back the way it had come, though of course the riders could outstrip it easily.

There were Mercers and Mercers, Dal knew. If this little band turned out to be the Monarch’s own – those wandering hero-magistrates who kept the peace, helped the needy, defended the weak, and put people like Dal Arche in his place – then his plan was sunk even before it could get under way. The Monarch had such good intentions, Dal knew, and would be horrified to learn that a peasant woodsman was gnawing at the fabric of Commonweal society in such a way. The Monarch was far, far away, though. The Monarch also, in Dal’s firmly held belief, reserved righteous indignation for the unruly peasants of this world, and turned a blind eye to the evils of the great and the good unless they ventured into outright treason.

The Monarch dispatched Mercers across the Commonweal to do her will, but the Commonweal was vast, and they were few. So it was that each noble house maintained its own elite, and called them Mercers for all that the title had never been earned. Dal was betting a great deal that these riders were locally grown. They would still be well trained and equipped, with glittering armour of steel and chitin, with bows and swords and majestic steeds. They would also be equipped with a thousand years of tradition telling them how much better they were than the wretches who dared offend against the natural order of the world.

Dal shrugged his recurved bow off his shoulder, one hand selecting an arrow from his quiver.

The Commonweal had always had brigands, like a beast had ticks. They had included disaffected peasants, criminals, the estranged and the misfits. They had preyed on good and honest folk, and the princes had hunted them down and brought justice back to the land. Everyone knew that, of course.

There were fewer stories about those times when a noble had gone bad: second sons and daughters not content to be left without an inheritance, the cruel, the mad, the feuding – those who rallied evildoers about them and set themselves up as petty tyrants. It was considered bad luck to tell stories about such fallen princes, in case their virtuous kin should take offence.

Dal watched as the band of horsemen galloped closer to the burning village, while sparks drifted either side of him or landed, stinging, on his skin. The now-empty storehouse would catch fire soon enough, completing his day’s work.

It was always the case: a few of Dal’s people had not withdrawn soon enough, still chasing some last piece of loot, or just believing they knew better. One of them caught an arrow in the chest, the lead Mercer standing up in the saddle to loose it without his mount’s speed slackening at all. The rest scattered as the six riders thundered between the burning ruins of the houses, aiming directly for the barge.

In the past, brigands had been nothing but angry, maladjusted farmers, with perhaps the odd woodsman amongst them who could string a bow. Mercers, even the local kind, were a constant terror to them. Even now the stragglers among Dal’s people were fleeing in all directions, while the Mercers rode past them, turning in the saddle to aim and loose arrows at every target, and hitting them more often than not.

Dal took careful aim and loosed, too, but the rearmost rider shouted a warning even as he did so. The shaft struck the approaching woman’s shimmering