"I can't cut them off... That's what I have the hat for." he shrugged, swiping the cape, worn over his shoulder, aside. But his keen ears caught the sound of skittering behind the door; something brushing against the wood.
Someone listening behind the door.
"Give me a moment." he growled, freeing the sword in its sheath, hanging by his side, and with long steps got over to the door. The key in the door turned, slowly, and he let it open to a tight gap.
The gasp of someone from the other side was more than audible. He released a deep sigh, and his hand reached through the gap. A sound almost like the yowl of a cat could he heard as he dragged a young serving girl in, throwing her amid the blood and bedclothes, scattered around, and promptly locked the door behind them.
"You were listening behind the door." It was a plain statement, no doubts to be heard in Athran's voice.
"No, M'lord, I wasn't, I swear... I wasn't... I'd never..." she clasped her hands together, her watery eyes begging him for mercy - mercy that the tall lord in black had none of.
"You were. Don't lie, or I'll cut your tongue out." he growled. She froze, giving desperate glances to their surroundings, and quivering like a hare before a fox. She caught sight of Iyla, but thinking her simply for another man, she averted her eyes moments after.
Athran didn't have the patience to wait. Unsheathing his sword briskly, he pointed its tip at the girl's head, straight between her eyes. "A black stone. About an inch long. Where is it?" he asked her in an icy tone, but for a reply, he got nothing but quivers. She shook, tearing up, and broke down straight before him. "I... M'lord... I don't... I don't know... I never saw no stone... Please, m'lord, please, don't..."
Don't do what? Don't cut your tongue out? I won't. he thought as a frown set on his brow, and for a moment, he brought the sword back.
"May the gods forgive me." a somber whisper left his lips.
And the black blade lashed back, piercing her skull through, and pinning her to the bed. A horrid display of violence, added to the severed head and blood-covered body of the lord, laying beside the bed.
"We can't afford any witnesses, and she didn't know anything useful." he proclaimed coldly, drawing the sword from the dead girl's head, and wiping it against the bed. "To think that I used to be a knight. My accursed father must be writhing in his grave, together with all the worms that ate the flesh off his bones." A sigh forced its way through his grit teeth, and he sheathed the blade, casting a quick glance down, but finding no blood, soiling his clothes.
"We can't leave anyone in this manor alive. Where next, then?" he questioned Iyla.