This Haught was a freedman. The Nisibisi witch had freed him. And Niko had saved him from interrogation, long ago, at Straton's hands. Strat, the Stepsons' chief inquisitor, was no man to cross and one who was so good at what he did that his mere reputation loosened tongues and bowels.

So it was not that these were strangers, or even that they picked the beggar up between them and carried him toward the open gate beyond which lights blazed in skin-covered windows, that gave Niko pause. It was that Haught, who'd been little more than a frightened whelp, the slave's collar bound 'round his very soul, when last Niko had chanced across him, was giving orders with assurance and had, by the way his aura glittered blue, magical attributes to back him up.

There was nothing magical about Vis's aura, just the red and pink of distress and passion held in check-and fear, the spice of it tingling Niko's nerves as he moved to intercept them at the gate, sword drawn and warming as it always did when in proximity to magic.

"Vis, he's got a weap-"

"Remember me, puds?" Niko said, halting all three in a practiced interception. "Don't move; I just want to talk."

Vis's hand was on his hip and a naked blade would surely follow; Niko let his attention dwell on Vis, though Haught ought to have been his first concern.

And yet Haught didn't push the beggar (moaning, "Whaddya mean, Haught, 's nothin' wrong with a little fresh air ...") at Niko or cast a spell, just said, "Years ago-the northern fighter, isn't it? Oh yes, I remember you. And so does someone else, I'd bet-"

Vis-too taut, planning something-interrupted, "What is it, soldier? Money? We'll give you money. And work for an idle blade if ... Remember you?" Vis took a step forward and Niko felt, rather than saw, eyes narrow: "Right, that's right. I know who you are. We owe you one, is that it? For saving us from Tempus's covert actors downtown. Well, come on in. We'll talk about it indoors."

"If," Haught put in on that silken tongue that made Niko wonder what he might be walking into, "you'll sheath that blade and treat our invitation as what it is ... a luxury. If you want to fight, we'll not be using bronze or steel in any case."

Niko looked between the two, still holding up their beggar friend, and sheathed his blade. "I don't want your hospitality, just some information. I'm looking for Roxane -and don't tell me you don't know who I mean."

It was Haught's laughter that made Niko know he'd found more than he'd bargained for: It sent chills screeching up and down his spine, so self-assured it was and so full of taunt and anticipation. "Of course I know-me and my mistress both know. But don't you think, fighter, that by now Roxane's looking for you? Come in, don't come, wait here, go your way-whatever choice, she'll find you."

My mistress, Haught had said. Someone else, then, had taught him what Niko saw there-enough magic for it to be an attribute, not an affectation; real magic, not the prestidigitator's tricks that abounded in Sanctuary's third-rate Mageguild.

Niko shook his head and his hand of its own accord found his sword's pommel and rested there as he retreated a pace.

By then Vis was saying, "It's not a thing I'd seek, soldier, were I you. But we'll give you what we can to help you on your way to her. Yes, by all that's unholy, we'll surely give you that."

When Roxane, in her Foalside haunt, an old manor house refurbished from velvet hangings to weeds head-high in her "garden," heard a footstep belonging not to an undead or to one of her snakes-who occasionally took human form-outside her window, she went personally to see who her uninvited guest might be.

It was a Nisi type, a youth she'd never noticed, some local denizen with a trace of Nisibisi blood.

His soul was smooth and unctuous over customary evil; he was some familiar of another power here. He said, far back in the dark with wards springing up between them, "I've brought you something. Madam. You're going to like him. A gift from Haught, in case things go your way in the end."

Then there was a soft "pop" and the presence was gone, if it had ever been there. Haught. She'd remember.

Just as she was turning, a pebble skittered, a soft whicker cut the night. She blinked-twice in one night, her best wards violated, slit like cobwebs? She'd have to make the rounds tomorrow, set up new protections.

And then she concentrated on what was there: a horse, for certain; and a person on it, a person drugged and tied to its saddle.

A present from this Haught. She'd have to thank him. She went out into her garden of thornbush and nightshade, down to where the water mandrake threw poisonous tubers high along the White Foal's edge.

And there, in the luminous spill from the polluted river's waves, she glimpsed him. Niko, drugged to a stupor, or drunk-the same. Her heart wrenched, she ran three steps, then calmed herself. He was here but not of his own will.

Fingers working a soft and silken spell, she half-danced toward him. Niko was her beloved and yet her undoing lay within him. Seeing him was more the proof: She wanted to take him, cut his bonds away, heal him and caress him. Not the proper reaction for a witch. Not the proper motivation for Death's Queen. She'd sent for him, used Randal the mageling to lure him, but she dared not take him now, not use him thus. Not when this Haught was obviously tempting her.

Not when Roxane had a war on her hands, a war of power with a necromant called Ischade, a creature of night who might just have orchestrated this untimely meeting.

So, while Niko, bent over his horse's neck, slept on, she came up to the horse, which flattened its ears but did not move away, cut the bonds that held the fighter to his saddle, and said, before sending him away, "Not now, my love. Not yet. Your partner Janni, your beloved Sacred Band brother, is the thrall of the necromant Ischade-he lies in unpeaceful earth, is rousted out to do her foul bidding and wear her awful collar at night. You must free him from this unnatural servitude, beloved, and then we will be together. Do you understand me, Niko?"

Niko's ashen head raised and he opened his eyes-eyes still asleep, yet registering all they saw. Roxane's heart leaped; she loved the touch of his gaze, the feel of his breath, the smell of his suffering.

Her fingers spelled his fate: He would remember this moment as a true dream-a dream that, his maat would understand, bore all he needed to know.

She stepped forward and kissed him, and a moan escaped his lips. It was hardly more than a sigh, but enough of a sign to Roxane, who could read his heart, that Niko had come to her at last-of his own free will, to the extent that free will was possessed by mere men.

"Go to Ischade. Free Janni's spirit. Then get you both here to me, and I shall succor you."

She touched his forehead and he sat up straight. His free hands reined the horse around and he rode away- ensorceled, knowing and yet unknowing, back to his hostel where he could sleep undisturbed.

And tomorrow, he would do evil unto evil for her sake, and then, as he had never truly been, Nikodemos would be hers.

In the meantime, Roxane had preparations to make. She quit the Foalside, went inside, and looked in upon the Hazard Randal. Her prisoner was playing cards with her two snakes-snakes which she'd given human form to guard him. Or sort of human form-their eyes were still ophidian, their mouths lipless, their skin bore an ineradicable cast of green.

The mage, his torso bound to his chair with blue pythons of power, had both hands free and just enough free will left to give her a friendly wave: She had him tranquilized, waiting out the time until his death day-the week's end, come Ilsday, if Niko did not return by then.