The Lawkeeper of Samara (The Fourth Age of Shanakan Book 2) by Tim Stead

knowing the sinister purpose for which it was intended, though it was hard to image any purpose for such a device that was not sinister.
    He ran his hands across every flat surface, but there was no mark. That itself could be a clue. The killer could be a smith. Even if not, there were only about two hundred smiths in the city, and it might be a productive strategy to speak to all of them. It would take time, of course, but surely nobody could forget creating such a piece?
    He went back into the law house and collected a cup of hot jaro from the cook Ulric had hired. It was sweetened with honey the way he liked it and enlivened with some Pekkish spice. He took it back to his room and sat for a while thinking on all that had happened in the last few days. Dusk was approaching, and he was impatient to begin laying his trap. He found that he couldn’t sit for long, so he got up and walked the empty corridors of the law house. He had sent them all away apart from Ulric and the cook. There were seven of them, and of course the two guards on loan from Ocean’s Gate who would not knowingly be part of the trap.
    He walked into the big room. Empty chairs clustered around the bare table. It looked a naked and forlorn space without the lawkeepers to fill it.
    He drifted on, eventually coming to the newly enlarged front hall where Ulric was sitting behind his counter. He put down the paper he was reading when he saw Sam.
    “Chief?”
    “Bored,” Sam said. “Worried.”
    Ulric nodded. Sam noticed that Arla’s bow was lying on the desk. Ulric had unstrung it and had been in the process of oiling the bow string. He saw Sam looking at the bow.
    “A fine weapon,” he said. “Needs to be cared for.”
    “She’ll be back,” Sam said.
    Ulric nodded. “More coming in tomorrow,” he said. “More for the job. Another five.”
    “Where do you find them?” Sam was genuinely curious. He’d put it about that he was recruiting, but there had been little response. Ulric made people appear out of nowhere, and they were all of good quality, men and women with skills and more than the average common sense.
    “You forget, Chief,” his mouth quirked into a smile. “I know everybody.”
    Sam sipped his jaro. It was beginning to cool. “I’ll be out all morning,” he said.
    “Of course.” Ulric knew about the plan, the trap. “They’re coming in the afternoon.”
    Outside the sky was darkening. Sam went back to his office. He stopped in the kitchen on the way back and had his cup filled again. There was a map on his desk. Ulric had found it for him earlier in the day. He had no idea how Ulric managed to do so much while never seeming to move from the front desk.
    He opened the map. It showed the streets of Samara, the important buildings, the river, the sea. It even showed the old dock in Gulltown where the warehouse had been. He studied the area. More than a dozen streets, alleys and lanes led from the waterside into the warren that was Gulltown’s heart. Some were too narrow for a cart to pass, and some of them twisted their way through the buildings so that there was no stretch straight for more than fifty paces. It was no surprise, looking at this, that Findaran had been unable to catch their watcher.
    He took the map into the big room and laid it on the table there. Sam could not go with his men. He must wait here until morning, and he worried about that. He would have felt better if Arla had been with them. Her level head would have been an asset.
    “Am I the first?” It was Gilan. Sam looked at the window and was surprised to see the night outside. The big room was lit with lamps, and somehow he hadn’t noticed them. Ulric must have lit them before Sam came into the room.
    “The first,” Sam confirmed.
    But in minutes they were all there, and Sam could feel a keen edge to the atmosphere. They wanted this.
    Sam told them the plan. He pointed to the map and gave each of them instructions. It was clear enough in his head