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what was he doing? Sitting alone in a tavern in one of the city’s less salubrious districts, scarcely half an hour’s walk from his palace - perhaps he’d finally gone mad? Then he heard his own name mentioned by the storyteller, and Aracnan’s, and every nerve in his body came alive. He’d not been paying the man much attention, so all he caught was that Aracnan had demanded to speak to the teller’s son. Now why would that be?
    He sipped the beer, no longer tasting it. There was something in the air that disquieted him: first the seeker, following his death to Tirah, then the casual mention of Aracnan. Bahl could almost see a thread weaving its way through the streets, snagging on his shoulder and drawing him into its web. It was a string of unlikely or inexplicable events … some agency was at work here.
    The man holding court claimed that he had seen the mercenary slipping into the palace when he had been a member of the cavalry there. Then, with a self-important ring to his voice, he added that he had been told to forget the whole incident by the Chief Steward himself when he raised the matter with him.
    Bahl wrinkled his nose, unconvinced. He doubted even the most alert guard could notice Aracnan’s passage if Aracnan didn’t wish to be seen, and his Chief Steward tended to threaten his subordinates in a more direct fashion. It was strange to hear the storyteller use Aracnan’s name, though: Bahl had been acquainted with Aracnan for more than a hundred years, yet he knew almost nothing about the man. Even the rumour that Aracnan had been the one to teach Kasi Farlan, the first white-eye and last of King Veriole’s line, how to use a sword was unconfirmed. That was before the Great War, seven thousand years ago. Bahl could believe it. Immortals kept their secrets close, and no mortal had eyes like Aracnan’s.
    The little Bahl had picked up about this current story was enough for him to want to meet the boy Aracnan had apparently wanted to talk to. Aracnan had his own agenda, but sometimes he was commanded by the Gods themselves; whatever his purpose, it was always worth investigating his actions.
    An old man sitting by the fireside coughed obviously. Bahl guessed he was the usual storyteller in this tavern, and had not taken kindly to some dirty wagoner taking centre stage. A love of stories and mysteries was at the heart of Farlan culture: a Farlan liked nothing so much as to tell all manner of grand tales, washed down with a drink or four. It was a poor tavern indeed that couldn’t afford a resident storyteller to entertain the customers.
    The elderly man smoothed his beard and shuffled in his seat as he played his audience. Bahl smiled inwardly; Aracnan’s greatest feats were known to only a handful of people, and there might well be even greater exploits that had gone completely unnoticed by history.
    ‘Aracnan is as mysterious as the Gods themselves,’ the old man began, his voice pitched low to make his audience listen the more closely. ‘Some say he fought at the Last Battle. Perhaps he is one of the cursed Vukotic family.’
    He paused, allowing a mutter to pass around the room as men frowned and gestured and murmured incantations under their breath, invoking protections against the cursed. Superstitious fools, Bahl thought to himself, only daemons are attracted by speaking their name.
    The old man cleared his throat again, regaining his audience’s attention. ‘Maybe he’s a daemon that wanders the Land. Nothing is known for sure, except that he appears without warning, often just before a battle. He commands his own fee and takes no argument. Do you remember the late Duke Helrect?’
    ‘The one who killed his wife and became a monk?’ asked one of the more vocal listeners.
    The storyteller nodded gravely. ‘He did become a monk, but I heard from the Captain of the Guard there a darker tale. It was rumoured that his wife was a sorceress who consorted with daemons and wanted to enslave the