Whispers from my Muse - "His Last Job"

There were only two real reasons for somebody to be awake and active during the nights of the dead moons. You were either stupid beyond understanding, or you were a hunter that preyed on the stupid. The coal black unicorn that had been watching the palace grounds for two weeks was very much the hunter, as those who knew of him would swear to as they found other places to be suddenly.

Every night, well before those who took comfort in the darkness became active, he had come to the palace and picked out a place suitable for his needs. Each night he had watched, listened, learned and memorized the people and patterns that formed the royal palace. Each morning he had slipped away, better prepared for the coming of his victim and the final choice he would have to make. A choice that would either destroy the guild he had served all his life, or himself.

Kyrn, sometimes known in the dark corners of the city as "The Black Rose," was a Master of Assassin's. For the first time in his long life though, he deliberately hunted one of his own.

While the Assassin's Guild and the City Guard both figured the world would be better off if their opposite number was removed, they were also pragmatic enough to realize that attempting that removal would be unhealthy. Over the centuries both the guild and the guard had worked out an uneasy truce of sorts. The guard stayed out of the lower town, the guild didn't accept contracts against people in high town. The middle town was loosely owned by both.

Until now, when for the first time in almost a thousand years, the guild was about to violate that pact in a moment of insanity. When it was about to execute a contract against the royal family.

Not if Kyrn had anything to say about it though ...

The contract as always, had been presented to the guild masters for their acceptance. To attempt to hire an assassin without that acceptance was always fatal to the messenger, and usually to the patron in question. The argument that started with this contract had almost proved fatal to a few guild masters, and might do so yet.

Though only a guild third, Kyrn was more then a twenty years older then those he had let pass him in supposed authority. Long ago, he had acquired the reputation of being the best the guild had, of being the one person you didn't want to offend. Those who tested him were never heard of again. The only sign they had even existed being a new weapon appearing in a large display case in Kyrn's office. It had been several years since the guild had produced someone foolish enough to test the "Old 'Corn".

That too would soon change.

The contract had been proposed by a small group of local merchants, which was not at all unusual. Assassination was an accepted tool of negotiation by those who bought and sold almost anything, including lives. This time though, the target had been a close cousin to the King himself. As Kyrn subconsciously verified the current positions of the castle guards against where he "felt" they should be, he allowed himself a grimace of distaste at the memory of that meeting. The memory of everyone else’s look of puzzlement as he had laughed at the messenger.

The merchants had decided that they were tired of the taxes being levied against one of their more disreputable sources of income. Their solution was to eliminate the person who was responsible for those taxes, to send a message to the King that things had gone further then they would allow. If loosing one cousin didn’t get the message across, they intended to have his successors removed as well.

They wanted to start a war, and they wanted the guild to get the blame. The gold they’d promised though had been a sum so large that they’d been allowed to leave under their own power. Out voted and surrounded by people who he figured were insane, Kyrn had decided to go to work in private to salvage what he could.

Kyrn shifted position slightly in the dark, the years when he could remain motionless the entire night slipping ever farther behind him. As he settled again, he closed his eyes and listened to the songs his horn sang to him. The rough songs of the more experienced guards in the vicinity, rich in melody. The purer songs of the younger guards who had not yet had time to enjoy the full benefits their uniform had on the ladies in the surrounding town. The quiet and pure notes of the very few whom had not yet taken that first step with another.

All these songs played through Kyrn's mind as he sat there. As he sat and waited for the song to appear that would tell him someone new had appeared in the area. Someone he would probably have to kill.

The only comfort Kyrn could take in that thought was that it would not be someone he had trained who would try to fulfill this contract. He had exercised his option as Master to withhold his own from the list of those who might be selected. That action had not gone unnoticed by those he had argued with. His one hope was that they hadn't realized how much he would risk to prevent what he had seen as a fatal mistake.

It was only a few hours before dawn when the event Kyrn had both waited for and feared, occurred. The songs he had been weeks memorizing and following were joined by a new melody. A melody who's source was slowly and surely working its way onto the palace grounds from outside. It was also a melody that bothered Kyrn somehow even as he forced himself into action against the protests of a body that time was catching up with.