Opening Acts

  The Dread Hammer

  by Trey Shiels

  Visualize my brother, Smoke, as he stalks the forest road. He is a shadow, lost amid the mottled shadows of the trees. The woman he hunts does not see him. She is alone, hurrying south toward Nefion. A gauntlet of imagined fears lies before her-roots to bruise her toes, windfalls to block the way, wolves within the shadows-but none of these slow her pace. They are nothing against the fear that follows behind her-and my brother's presence she suspects not at all.

  He is a murderer, my Smoke. Though he's just eighteen, at least 172 lives have ended against the edge of his sword. Maybe more. It's likely there are slayings I haven't discovered yet. Smoke doesn't keep count of the dead, but I do.