by Ari Marmell
The thief shrugged. “Flintlocks misfire. It happens.”
“Not that conveniently, it doesn't.”
“Guess we'll never know.” She started to walk past him; he stepped over to block her way.
“You put me off once before,” he said. “This time, I'm not moving until you explain.”
Shins nodded slowly. “Very well.” A quick leap to the side and a single step, and she was past him. “That's probably wise. You stay and guard the hall. I'll go hunt for the gallery.”
She'd gotten perhaps five paces when he caught up with her and took the lead, muttering all manner of ignoble imprecations.
Cyrille had been entirely correct. The corridor to which he led her, branching off the main hallway, was absolutely unobtrusive. The entrance was a narrow archway, smack dab in the midst of a number of arch-shaped niches; not hidden in any real sense, just readily overlooked.
Which makes sense, since it leads to an overlook. Shins actually had to catch herself before she giggled. Get a hold of yourself, you gibbering gosling.
The “gallery,” as Cyrille had called it, was really just a tongue of balcony, jutting farther out than the rest of it. Streaks and footprints in the dust, from the two entryways to the rim and back, had probably been left by the workman who'd come through here to hang the banners.
Banners that did, indeed, hang remarkably close to the balcony itself. Shins could easily creep to the edge and look between the nearest two.
One of which displayed the leonine visage of Cevora.
Of course.
She also realized, studying the handrail that ran around the gallery and the banners hanging a few feet away, that there was only a single vantage point from which they could see the hall below. If they were both to have a clear view, one of them would have to lie atop the other.
Also of course.
“On your stomach,” she said, finger jutting imperiously at the spot. “All the way to the railing, so you can look through.”
“Um, all right…” He dropped, scowling at the dust that now caked his outfit, and scooted until his face nearly protruded over the edge. “I can see the hall,” he confirmed.
Widdershins sighed. “If you even think an inappropriate comment about this, I'll kick you over the side.”
“Um, about what, exactlllrrrrrk…?!”
“I can hear you thinking,” she warned as she grudgingly climbed onto and flopped down atop him.
“No, I'm…really not thinking at all right now….”
“Hush, now. Spying.”
At some point while she and Cyrille had been getting settled, Maline and the others had returned to the banquet hall. Only a few of the groups of hostages were currently visible from Widdershins's angle, but those she could see looked absolutely terrified, their faces pale and twisted.
And no wonder. They must assuredly have heard the shots from above; the fusillade had been a veritable man-made storm. For the Crows to then return without any of the servants and guards with whom they'd departed—well, it required precious little imagination to picture what must have happened.
Maline himself was standing beside one of the food tables, munching on a sloppy handful of meat and speaking with Josce. She wished she could hear as well as see, but even Olgun's powers were limited. He probably could enhance and focus her hearing enough for her to pick out what was being said, but it would take more of his energies and concentration than she was willing to risk. The absolute last thing she needed was her god running low on fuel before this whole mess was concluded.
Josce eventually nodded to whatever he'd been told, turned, and walked out of sight beneath the balcony from which Widdershins watched. Maline continued stuffing food into his face.
“I've seen raccoons with better table manners,” she whispered to Cyrille, who—as best she could tell, given their relative positions—nodded.
Any further commentary on the thug's eating habits would have to wait, however. Josce reappeared some minutes later, this time carrying a wooden box. Maline swept a large platter of fruit and a glass decanter from the table—the resultant sound rather akin to hurling a suit of armor through a stained glass window—and pointed. The balding servant placed his burden there, as directed, tossed open the lid, and stepped back.
“Huh,” Cyrille and Shins said in unison.
Maline reached into the box, removed the first of what appeared to be a few dozen lead balls, and began reloading his pistols. One by one, the other Crows came and did the same—some taking handfuls of much smaller pellets for use in their blunderbusses, most sticking to pistol balls. All of which made reasonable sense…
Until Shins noticed that several of the Crows were unloading weapons they hadn't fired, replacing their old ammunition with the new.
“What the hell?!” Judging by the question, Cyrille had spotted the same thing.
Shins shrugged, a truly awkward motion given where she lay. “I haven't the first hint of an idea of a notion of a clue. I—”
Her throat squeezed itself shut in a horrified choke as Maline and several of the newly rearmed Crows began ordering another group of hostages—servants, again—to their feet.
“Oh, gods.” Cyrille's shoulders shook beneath her. “It hasn't…He's not giving Veroche any time! He can't possibly expect…Shins, we have to stop them. We—”
“We can't.” It wasn't a whisper so much as a ragged scrap of voice, ripped from her soul.
“What?!”
Cyrille shoved her off and rolled until he could sit facing her, his glare accusing. “How can you say that? You know what's going to happen to them, we can't—”
She didn't know if it was her expression or her tears of frustrated grief that finally stopped him. “Cyrille…” She cleared her throat, tried again. “How would we stop them? We're in the same position we were before. We'd most likely die trying, and that'd still leave most of the Crows with the rest of the hostages. We wouldn't…We can't.”
“No…” He, too, had begun to weep softly. “Shins, there has to be something we can do. Please, there has to be!”
“We can end this. We can find out what's happening here—there's definitely something more going on than we know, than he's said—and we end it. Until we do that, nothing we do is going to make a bit of difference.”
“If we don't do it fast,” he muttered bitterly, “there won't be anyone left to save, anyway.”
Shins rolled to her feet, waited for Cyrille to do the same with rather less grace. “We follow Josce,” she decided. “Maybe there's something special about those pistol balls, or…I don't know. But he's the only one we've seen involved in something beyond the banquet hall and the—the ramparts. So we see where he's been scurrying off to, yes?”
Cyrille's lips parted…then hung open, voiceless, at the sound of speech from beyond the archway.
“Hey! Any of you guys check this little hallway over here?”
Once again, the pair spoke in perfect unison. “Oh, figs.”
“Subtle! Do you…remember subtle?!” Cyrille panted, wheezing his words between gasps as he pounded up the winding stairs, struggling to keep pace with his companion. “I'm pretty sure you…were the first one to mention subtle!”
Widdershins's shrug shouldn't even have been visible in the midst of their mad dash, but somehow it was clear enough. “I tried to be subtle!”
“You tried—you stabbed him in the arse!”
“He was about to shoot you! I thought this would be quieter than the gun going off.”
“It wasn't!”
“Well, I didn't know a man could scream like that, did I? Now shut up and run!”
They ran, and a shouting throng of Crows followed.
Getting past the first of Maline's people and escaping the balcony hadn't been difficult; not with both surprise and Olgun on their side. Getting past them quietly, however, had very clearly proven untenable.
At the next landing, perhaps three or four floors down from the peak of the tower into which they'
d fled, Shins paused. “Keep going!” she hissed. And then, “Don't argue, go!”
Scowling, Cyrille went.
“Olgun…” She was already sprinting into the tight circular hall. “We have about fifteen seconds…”
A familiar prickling, a surge of strength, and Shins found herself running faster than she ever had, perhaps faster than anyone, even with magic, ever had.
She was already exhausted, soaked with sweat, by the fifth or sixth step. But it would be enough.
Several rooms were visible at a cursory examination from the landing, all of which stood with doors wide open, allowing airflow through the largely unused level. She reached one of them, slammed it shut, and zipped back toward the stairs. Just before hitting the first step, she yanked one of the various pouches from her belt—a small one, containing nothing but a few coins and an eating knife—and dropped it against the wall, where it could conceivably have been torn from her in her haste.
She was barely around the bend, out of sight of the landing, when the Crows reached it. Her whole body shook; perspiration dripped into her eyes, stinging and burning. She clenched her jaw so tightly it ached, the only way she could keep herself from gasping loudly enough to be heard below.
Please work, please work, I don't know who the happy horses I'm even praying to, I don't really care, just please work.
It did. She heard a wordless cry from the first of the Crows, and then a barrage of footsteps haring off into the corridor. Shins allowed herself a relieved sigh and resumed her own climb.
The trick itself wouldn't buy them much time. A couple of minutes, if that, for the Crows to risk a presumed ambush, burst through the door to the room, and then do a quick search of the neighboring rooms when they realized the first was empty.
That brief delay, however, would buy them a longer one. They had two or three higher levels in which to hide, and the Crows would have no way of knowing which; they'd have to search them all.
“All right,” she panted as she caught up with her companion. “We need to take shelter somewhere, catch our breath. I suggest the top, yes? It'll take them longest to get to; they can't afford to start at the top and work down, would give us too much of an opening to escape.”
“That makes sense,” Cyrille said dubiously. “But aren't they likely to think of that themselves? Realize the top floor is the best choice and start there after all?”
“Nope. If they do figure that the top floor is the best choice, they'll also probably figure that we'd figure they'd figure it, so we wouldn't hide on the top floor.”
“Um…What?”
“Trust me, I've dealt with these sorts of people a lot. You can always count on them to be stupid enough to use it against them, but not so stupid that they're too stupid to use it against them.”
“I…You know what? Let's just go.”
They had almost reached the top when they heard the salvo of gunfire, reverberating from outside, pounding in through the windows. It was followed, almost immediately, by terrified wails from below; the hostages remaining in the banquet hall had heard the shots, too.
“You're right.” Shins once more lay a hand on her friend's shoulder, though whether to comfort him or to steady herself, she couldn't have said. “Let's just go.”
“What now?”
“Now,” Shins said, “we take a few minutes to rest up enough to hopefully not die.”
As with the first room they'd occupied—years ago, it seemed, when her most immediate worry was foisting off his advances—this one was brick-walled, empty of furniture, redolent of mildew, and wore dust and insect carapaces like a fashion statement. No telling at all what it might have been used for, back when it presumably had a use.
Unlike that earlier room, this one was even more cramped, thanks to the harsh slope of the tower's roof. It was also filthier and boasted a window—a narrow thing with heavy, semirotting shutters—to the outside. Outside, and a rather stomach-lurching view, or so Widdershins assumed. She had no interest in checking; it was far more important to sit.
“We need a way out of here,” she muttered eventually, glaring with an absentminded resentment at the cracking door and its tarnished handle.
“Out of the tower or the castle?” Cyrille snipped.
“Uh, the castle? So we can talk to Veroche, see what's going on, tell her what we've learned? Maybe sneak the prisoners out? We know the way out of the tower.”
“Oh, we certainly do. We just can't use it!”
“You don't have to be grouchy at me about it! How is that my fault?”
“How is…?” Cyrille's jaw went so slack, Shins was surprised it didn't start to wobble, a flesh-and-bone pendulum. “You led us here! You're the one who ran into a tower when we were being chased! Towers, in general, tend to only allow travel in two basic directions!”
“What was I supposed to do?” she demanded.
“Um, maybe run somewhere that wasn't a tower?”
“How was I supposed to know? You're the one who knows the castle, you turkey!”
“You took the lead! I was just following!”
“Well, that's your mistake, isn't it? Why are you blaming me?”
Cyrille made a sound very much as though he'd just sat on a teapot. The hand he threw upward in exasperation might have made a more impressive gesture if the result hadn't been to shower himself with dust, forcing him to muffle a sneeze.
“There's the main door,” he rasped when he was finally done. “Obviously not an option. There's a servants’ entrance, directly to the kitchen, but that's right off the banquet hall. I think we need to figure Maline's got that one watched, too.”
“Probably, yes. Is that it? Nothing else?”
“Windows on some of the upper floors. Think you can climb down the outer wall?”
It was spoken sarcastically, but Shins actually considered it. “Too risky,” she said finally. “I'd have to either leave you behind or try carrying you, and I'm not thrilled with my chances in the latter case.” Far more quietly, in response to Olgun, “Well, I'm not sure we could! Of course it doesn't sound awkward to you; you're not the one with arms!
“Plus,” she continued, speaking for Cyrille once more and ignoring his truly befuddled expression, “if Maline's got people on the wall—and he almost has to, to make sure the reeve isn't trying anything—all it takes is one of them spotting us. A couple of shots or rocks on our heads, and splat. I can't believe there's not some other way!”
“There's supposed to be a postern gate somewhere,” the young Delacroix said slowly, clearly dredging his memory. “But that's not going to help us, either.”
“No? Why not?”
“Have you seen the overgrowth, Shins? I guess not; the city's kept the area near the main door clear. Everywhere else, though, it's pretty damn impressive. If I'm remembering what I read correctly, between that overgrowth, the settling of the foundations, and the rusting of the iron, the gate became impossible to open. I mean literally impossible, even with hammers and prybars. Might as well have been part of the wall. So everyone ignored it, and it's pretty much been forgotten since then.”
“We should at least take a look,” she insisted. “Where is it?”
“Does forgotten have a lot of different meanings where you're from, Shins?”
“You lost a door?!”
“It's not as though I was responsible for the damn thing!”
Shins loosed something between a sigh and a groan, made of sheer exasperation, and stood. “So we still have no idea how to get out of here or what to do next! Fat lot of help your ‘inside knowledge’ has been!”
“You wouldn't have gotten near this far without me!” Cyrille, too, shot to his feet. “You'd still be wandering around lost on the second floor!”
“Or I'd have already solved this whole thing! And I'll tell you something else!”
“Yeah? What's that?”
“We should probably stop shouting before the Crows hear us!”
Sudden silence.
The both of them stared; the both of them blushed just a bit. And then the both of them jumped at the clatter of boots on the nearby stairs.
“We have to get out of here. Now!”
Cyrille nodded, even as he asked the obvious question neither of them wanted asked. “How?”
How, indeed? The stairs were the only way down, and they were swarming with—
Except they're not the only way down, are they?
“Olgun? From before…How sure are you?”
The flare of emotion that ran through her said “very,” but it felt “iffy.”
It'd have to do.
Widdershins bounded to the window and hurled open the shutters. Hinges squealed, rotten wood split. Shins now had an unobstructed view of the fields and forests beyond Aubier.
And, as she'd fully assumed, a rather distressing plummet down to a very hard surface.
Ooh, this is going to be fun as a chamber pot full of ants.
“We're going to climb out,” she told him.
“Do you really think we have time for jokes right now?!”
“No. I really, really don't.”
Apparently, it dawned on Cyrille, then, that she was entirely serious—judging from the tight gurgling sound in his throat.
“What…What happened to ‘too risky, you aren't happy with your chances’?!”
“Our options have dwindled, yes?”
“And the sentries on the walls?”
“We're not climbing the outer wall. The other towers should hide us from most directions, and if any happen to be near, they'll be looking outward, not inward.”
Probably.
“So come on, already!” she said, holding a hand out to him.
He put his own hand tightly on the hilt of his borrowed rapier. “I'll face the Crows.”
“Don't be stupid! Er.”
“It's a narrow doorway. I can hold it a while.”
“Cyrille—”
“No!”
Shins smiled softly, stepped over, and placed her hand on his shoulder. “All right.”
He began to smile as well—and Shins yanked him around, stood on her toes, and wrapped an arm around his neck.
“Olgun, please don't let me he hurt him.”