Den of thieves abt-1

by David Chandler

  It wasn’t a killing blow. The guard would heal in time and feel no lasting effects. But it was a painful wound, and it would render him unable to fight with a polearm for the rest of the night.

  Croy had promised himself that he would kill these men if he had to. He had steeled himself against the necessity. But this man had barely been paying attention. A killing stroke would have just been unsporting.

  A good shake of his left arm-which was starting to pain him-loosened the military fork from his shield. Croy let it clatter on the ground and then lifted his blooded sword high. “Who among you shall be next?” he shouted.

  Suddenly all the guards were staring at him.

  Chapter Seventy-Six

  Malden crept down a hallway that ran the length of the third floor, looking for the locked door that would lead to Hazoth’s sanctum. He could afford to be a little noisier now, since the hallway itself was far from silent.

  Visitors to the house would never be allowed up here, he knew. Because this was where the villa got strange. The floating dining room table, the living books, the man of smoke he’d seen downstairs had all been miraculous, even wonderful. But up here was where Hazoth’s real magic was done.

  The door to the laboratory was open, and Malden could hear foul ichors and mysterious fluids bubbling and oozing inside. A greenish light leaked out of that room, and the air before its door shimmered as if something inside were enormously hot-though when Malden passed it, he felt a chill and unwholesome breeze. The next room down the corridor concealed a kind of bestiary, judging from the mournful howling and frightened whimpering he heard. What manner of beasts were trapped within, whether ordinary animals to be experimented upon or exotic creatures kept as curiosities, he could not guess. He was not so foolish as to open the door just to find out.

  A third door seemed to breathe in as he passed it, then exhale as he watched. As if the door itself was alive. He could see a dim, shimmering light coming from the crack between the bottom of the door and the floorboards. The light was the dark red of pitfire. Malden couldn’t help himself. He reached for the doorknob, thinking to throw open the door and see what lay beyond.

  Just then, however, the door exhaled again-and filled the air before him with the stench of brimstone. He withdrew his hand quickly.

  It couldn’t be, could it? This must be some kind of sorcerous joke. There was no way even a man like Hazoth would have a door in his house that led directly to the pit itself. What if someone opened that door by mistake?

  But then-no one who was allowed up here would ever make that mistake. Not unless Hazoth wanted them to.

  Malden kept moving. He passed another door and heard a very different kind of sound-no less plaintive-coming from within. Someone was weeping in there, though not someone human. The sounds were unnatural and unnerving, rising now and then to a crescendo of wailing that never came from any human throat. Lower, and harder to hear, was a rhythmic grunting that did sound human. It would seem Hazoth was

  … entertaining in there.

  An urge to throw open the bedchamber door and see what a succubus really looked like gripped Malden, but he was able to fight it back down. It would be his doom, for one thing-to surprise Hazoth like that would be the very definition of folly. For another, judging by the sounds she made, he was willing to guess the succubus looked nothing like the toothsome painting on the wall of the House of Sighs.

  A few steps farther and he came to a quite ordinary door that proved to be locked when he tried its latch. This must be the door Kemper had described for him, he decided. The door that opened on the trapped corridor. Beyond lay the sorcerer’s unholy sanctum-and the crown.

  To this point Malden’s trespassing had gone without significant setbacks. Beyond this door the real game would begin, he knew. He wished for the thousandth time he could guess what lay beyond. Kemper hadn’t dared risk it, and Cythera had been unable to tell him anything. He would be wholly reliant on his own wits.

  Glancing up and down the corridor to make sure Cythera wasn’t about to walk up behind him, he knelt on a rug before the door. He unwrapped his tools from the hilt of his bodkin and laid them out carefully beside him. Then he took a small dark lantern from his belt, and carefully lit the tiny candle inside. The tin lantern let no light at all escape until he slid open a hatch on its side. The beam thus released was just wide enough to shine into a keyhole. He needed that light to determine which of his rakes and picks would open the lock.

  Yet when he looked into the lock, he recoiled in fright.

  There were teeth in there.

  Not metal spikes filed to points. Not the teeth of cog wheels. These teeth were the color of ivory and they glistened with saliva. Malden had no doubt that if he placed a finger inside the keyhole, those teeth would strip his flesh to the bone.

  There was no tongue in there that he could see. He did not think the mouth in the keyhole would scream if he tried to pick the lock. He inserted a long thin hook to test this hypothesis-he was ready to run and find some other way to the crown if it made any sound at all-but the only result was that the teeth bit down hard on his hook, and snapped it off an inch from where Malden’s fingers clutched it.

  Blast. That hook had not come cheap. Yet it could be replaced. He selected a much stronger tool, a torsion wrench, and slipped it into the lock. The teeth bit at it but Malden jerked it away in time-then shoved it in past the teeth when they opened up again. They closed on the iron tool and worried at it, but lacked the strength to chew right through it.

  Good enough. He fitted a stout rake inside the lock and felt for tumblers. They were there, just beyond the teeth, but they felt wrong. Less like the precisely crafted cylinders he was used to, and more like the ribbed flesh on the roof of a dog’s mouth. Malden pushed down his squeamishness and tickled the pins until they started to slide back. He put some tension on the wrench and it started to turn.

  Instantly the teeth began to gnash and chew at his tools with great fervor. A thin trickle of drool leaked from the lock and spilled down the outer surface of the door. Malden grimaced and rubbed the rake back and forth across the tumblers. It was no time for delicate work. One by one the tumblers slid back and the wrench turned all the way around. The dead bolt slammed open and the door creaked slightly as it opened an inch or two. Malden felt the pressure on his wrench and rake slacken, and he chanced another look into the lock. There were no teeth in there anymore-just a simple mechanical lock, something any dwarf could make in an afternoon.

  Yet when he inspected his tools, he saw dents and scratches all over them. The teeth had been real. Now they were not. He wrapped his tools back up and stepped into the hall of traps beyond, having no time to consider the nature of magic or the dubious humor of those who practiced it.

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  Gurrh dropped to one knee. The iron fencepost he’d been wielding clanged on the ground as he clutched at his left eye with both furry hands. The captain of the guards shouted an order and his troops moved back, giving the archer room to draw a perfect bead on the ogre’s face.

  The archer held his arrow and did not fire.

  Four of the guards rushed to take position around Croy, boxing him neatly. They made no immediate move to attack, but kept their weapons up and ready. As soon as the captain gave the order they could lunge forward in concert and skewer Croy as neatly as a bird on a spit.

  It seemed the captain wanted to parley first.

  In some ways that was a bad sign. It meant the captain-or more likely Bikker-knew of Croy’s reputation, and that he’d survived against far greater odds up at the palace. Of course, then he’d had the option of running away. That wasn’t possible here.

  Croy stood to his position, his shortsword pointed at the ground but held away from his body so if he needed to bring it up he would be ready to sweep it in a broad arc. As the captain approached, he breathed deeply and readied himself to move.

  “Your beast is strong,” the captain said, “but he h
as no belly for a fight. He hasn’t so much as scratched one of us. I think you may have picked the wrong partner.”

  Croy nodded at the man in way of salute. “He’s served his purpose. Half your men are disarmed, or carrying pieces of kindling that used to be weapons.”

  “But half of them are not. And we have plenty of spare weapons inside the fence. You look like you’re ready to take us all on by yourself, Sir Croy. I’d know why, before I order your death.”

  The wound in Croy’s back pulsed angrily. His body didn’t like being held so immobile. “I’ve come for the Burgrave’s crown. Thieves hid it here. If your master will give it up, I will leave you in peace. I’m not here to kill anyone, if I don’t have to.”

  “I’d prefer to avoid it myself. The city watch will be here soon, I have no doubt. Half the city must have heard us fighting down here. When they do arrive, I don’t want to have to explain what a dead ogre-and a dead knight-are doing on my lawn. I don’t know anything about a crown. But if you leave right now, I’ll let you take your pet away with you. This can just… stop.” The captain stared in frustration at Croy. He knew very well it wouldn’t end that way. “Surely, Sir Croy, this is the best you can hope for!”

  “I won’t leave without the crown,” Croy insisted.

  The captain raised his hands in disgust. Then he turned on his heel and threw a hand gesture toward the archer.

  The bowstring twanged, and the arrow shot through the air too quickly for human eyes to follow. It was headed straight at Gurrh’s uninjured eye. Simultaneously, the four guards around Croy stepped forward in perfectly drilled unison and lunged with their halberds and glaives.

  Gurrh snatched the arrow out of the air a split fraction of a second before it pierced his eye. He snapped it in half between his fingers.

  Even Croy’s senses, heightened by the thrill of combat and the onrushing specter of his own demise, could not follow everything that happened next. Luckily, he didn’t need to see or hear everything. He had run through this exact scenario a thousand times, back when he was training to become an Ancient Blade. His fencing master-Bikker-had known this day would come, when he was trapped in an unwinnable contest. He had trained Croy to be ready for it.

  In such a situation there was only one course of action that could be countenanced. You defended against every attack that time allowed-and you minimized the damage done by those attacks you could not avoid.

  Croy’s shield took a glaive blade in a glancing blow that sent the weapon up and away. His shortsword parried the axe blade of a halberd, the two weapons grinding together until the halberd was mired in the shortsword’s quillions. Croy threw his hips to one side, and a third attack-this one from behind-just grazed his side.

  The fourth hit home, and six inches of iron buried themselves in his side.

  Croy gasped in pain, but he knew the blow had missed his kidney. Which meant he would not die from the wound. At least not right away. That meant he still had some time. Time to counterattack.

  The glaive his shield had deflected was pointed up in the air. The man who wielded it was changing his grasp on the haft, trying to bring it back under his control. Croy put his head down and rushed toward the man, while twisting his right hand around to free his shortsword from the halberd that fouled it.

  He felt the sword slip free, but it was his shield that smashed the face of the glaive-bearer. That man went down with a grunt. Croy swung around and suddenly he was facing three opponents head on, rather than being surrounded by them.

  A halberd red with Croy’s own blood came swinging at his face. He slapped that attack away with the shortsword’s foible, then swung his shield around to block a glaive blow that came sweeping up at him from the ground. He no longer saw the men who held the weapons-he was too busy watching the movement of the halberd points and axe blades and the curved, glinting cutting edge of the glaive.

  A halberd drove point first toward his left leg. Croy brought the shield down and the point slammed into the oak, piercing it so he saw the point come through the inner side of the shield. Ignoring the pain in his back he threw his left arm wide, pulling the halberd out of the guard’s hands. He pressed his attack and brought the shortsword around to slice at the front of the disarmed man, cutting his tunic open and drawing a line of blood across his chest. The guard twisted to one side and fell away.

  That left him with two opponents, both of whom stood with their weapons across their bodies in defensive positions. Croy pointed at one, then the other, with his shortsword.

  “How much does Hazoth pay you?” he asked.

  “Not enough,” one of them answered. He threw his halberd on the ground and ran. The other was not long behind him-though he took his glaive with him.

  Chapter Seventy-Eight

  Malden stepped through the doorway and into the trapped corridor, careful to test his footing before he put his weight on the floor. It did not give way. He closed the cover of the hand lamp and closed his eyes tightly, then opened them wide again to adjust them to the darkness. He had expected some small amount of light in the corridor-surely at least a little would spill in from under the door or through the keyhole. Yet his eyes swam with the complete absence of light.

  Well, almost complete.

  The hallway was pitch-dark save for a blot of orange light high off in the distance. His eyes couldn’t seem to adapt to the gloom otherwise. He pulled back the hatch of his dark lantern, trying to see anything at all. A pale glow emanated from the lamp, but only for a moment before the candle inside the lantern sputtered and died.

  Malden cursed silently and reached into his tunic to find his tinderbox. Before he could reach it, though, the distant orange light flared up and he looked toward it. What had been a shapeless glow was now a fiery orb with a black center, surrounded by a burning ring of gold. It looked a great deal like the eyeball of some enormous monster.

  It looked at him. It looked into him. It looked through him. And then madness swept through him like a wind howling out of the pit.

  Malden staggered and clenched his eyes shut. He dropped the dark lantern but didn’t hear it fall. He clutched at his head with his hands.

  ’Ware the eye, Lockjaw had said. And nothing more. What had the old thief known? Had Lockjaw broken into this villa once and fallen afoul of the same trap? Or had he only heard tale of it from someone else? Malden had realized long ago that Lockjaw’s silence didn’t only serve to guard his secrets. It made other people feel it was safe to tell him their own. Lockjaw was a great treasure trove of gossip. Yet if only he’d been a bit less stingy with it this time… well. What hadn’t Lockjaw told him?

  Malden shook himself as if he were cold, though in truth he felt like he’d been singed by a firestorm. He opened his eyes, but shielded them with one hand so he wouldn’t meet the gaze of that hellish thing again.

  He needn’t have bothered. The eye was gone. So was the darkness.

  He was standing in a corridor perhaps twenty-five feet long. Tall windows stood every ten feet or so down its length, and moonlight spilled in to form pools of silver on the wooden floor. Between each patch of light lay impenetrable shadows. It was as if the hall were one column of a game board with alternating spaces of light and dark.

  He turned around and saw that the door he’d come through was gone. The wall there was smooth plaster and wood.

  A corridor lined with windows, letting in moonlight-he knew this place. He’d been here before. It was the same corridor he’d crossed to reach the tower room where the crown slept, guarded by its tentacled horror. It was the twin of the moonlit corridor from the palace. A place of traps that he had bested through his skills, and this its perfect double, as if a team of dwarves had worked at copying that hallway down to the placement of each dust mote, the angle of every beam of light. It was as if he’d been transported bodily back to the palace, back to the place of his greatest success-and worst blunder-as a thief. He could almost believe that this was exactly what had happened.
>
  Except-it couldn’t be. That hallway had been severely damaged in the demon’s magical enlargement. That hallway probably didn’t even exist anymore. Surely the Burgrave had no reason to rebuild it exactly as it had been. Which meant he was still in Hazoth’s house. Yet there was no way such a hallway could exist in the villa, in this particular location.

  There could be no windows in this hallway. The trapped hallway in Hazoth’s villa was surrounded on both sides by thick-walled chambers. There was no way the moon could come into this place.

  So the moonlight, at least, was an illusion. A phantasm conjured by Hazoth’s sorcery. And yet-why did it look so maddeningly like the corridor in the palace? Why would the magician choose to make this place the replica of a corridor that only a handful of people had ever seen? It made no sense.

  At least he knew the secret of the hallway. The shadows between the pools of moonlight would hide pressure plates that caused spring-loaded spears to shoot down and impale anyone foolish enough to step on them. The final patch of moonlight would have a collapsing floor, which opened on a shaft that led to the Burgrave’s dungeon, or its fell equivalent in the villa. Or-would it? Malden reviewed the plan of the villa in his head. The hallway lay at the center of the third floor. Below it was the gallery that overlooked the grand hall on the ground floor. So the shaft at the end of this hall would drop an unwitting thief onto the iron sphere.

  Perhaps there were other differences, too. Perhaps that was the point.

  Ah.

  ’Ware the eye. Malden thought he understood a little now. The eye had seen into his mind, and made this place from his memories. That was the only explanation for how it could look so exactly the same. It was a subtle spell, and a shrewd one. It could have made him think he was standing in a field of flowers, or at the bottom of the ocean, or in the pit itself. But he would have known instantly that those were illusions. The eye knew he expected to find a hallway full of traps-so it provided one. The illusion was so complete, and so convincing-the color of the moonlight was a wan silver, the air smelled of old stone and the clean air of Castle Hill. If he had not known better, he might have thought that the disorientation he felt was simply his eyes adjusting to the moonlight. He might have believed utterly in the hallway before him. Without Lockjaw’s warning, he probably would have thought all those things. The old man might just have saved his life.