by Dave Duncan
Emerald waited. The magical stench of rat was stronger in the tower, away from the Blades. She fancied she could even smell real rat, a whiff of sewers, and hear furtive rustling in the shadows. A massive book lay open beside the candelabra and the chair where Bandit had been keeping vigil outside the King’s door. To take her mind off the rats, she wandered across and snooped. It was a treatise on common law. Everyone to his own taste.
He came down again. “Give him a minute.”
She nodded. How did one fight magical rats? Oakendown had never mentioned such things, but Silvercloak seemed to have a million personal tricks up his sleeve. The Sisters could detect sorcery, but rarely was there any defense against it.
“I have had more bad news,” Bandit said grimly. “You want to hear it or wait until we know for sure?”
“Can this night get any worse?”
“A lot worse.”
“Tell me.”
“Wart. Seems he came to the Royal Door. He was unable to convince my men that he was genuine. They tried to chain him up. He ran off into the moor.”
The night could certainly get colder. Wart! She shivered convulsively. “But Nicely’s dogs…What do you mean, ‘unable to convince your men’? He had his cat’s-eye sword with him? They know him!”
“Perhaps he wasn’t genuine. He was one disarmed prisoner against four Blades, one knight, and an inquisitor, but he wounded two Blades slightly, broke both Sir Dragon’s collarbones so he’ll need a healing, and then escaped. Doesn’t that sound like sorcery?”
“It sounds like Wart.”
“Perhaps it does,” Bandit admitted with a wan smile. “I’m not sure where he’s been these last few days, but he certainly wasn’t supposed to come here. I’ll investigate properly in the morning. It may have been another Silvercloak trick.”
“I hope so!” she said furiously. “It had better be!” Wart, Wart, driven out on the moor to be hunted down by monsters?
“Follow, please.” Bandit went back up the ladder to the bedchamber.
Queen Estrith, if she had designed the room, had been very fond of frilly lace and silver ribbons. The window drapes, bed curtains, and upholstery all featured faded pink rosebuds. This decor did not suit the awesome presence of King Ambrose, who was sitting on the edge of the bed glaring, still not fully awake and clearly in a mood to chop off heads at random. He wore a woolen nightcap pulled down over his ears and a white linen nightgown that would have made a substantial tent. To prepare for his visitor he had swathed himself in a voluminous velvet cloak of royal blue and stuffed his feet in boat-sized slippers.
“Sister Emerald!” he growled.
Emerald bowed.
“What happened to your eye?”
“Naught of moment, sire. They’re here,” she told Bandit. “There’s sorcery in this room, sire. Black magic. It’s carried by rats.”
Even Ambrose’s harshest critics—he did not lack critics—never accused him of cowardice. The cunning, piggy eyes narrowed a little. Extra chins bulged out behind his fringe of beard. The fat lips pouted. But he did not flinch at this dread news.
“It would seem, Sister Emerald, that we are once again placed in your debt in dramatic circumstances. Pray take thought to what reward we may bestow on you and do not skimp in your request. We shall discuss this later.”
He seemed to have no doubt that there would be a later. “Well, Commander? The Lord Chancellor’s strategy has successfully drawn the wolf to the fold. What do you propose now?”
Bandit’s voice was much harsher than usual. “Sire, I am going to strip this room down to bare walls and put a dozen swords around you until the emergency is passed. By your leave—” He spun around and ran down the stair, shouting.
“Let us begin!” the King said, heaving himself upright. “I cannot stand this impsy-wimpsy furniture. Open that door, Sister. I intend to enjoy this.”
Emerald hastened to obey, and then had to back out to make way for a rosewood commode wrapped in the King’s great arms. He went to the battlements and let go. Sounds of demolition came a long moment later. As an antique that piece had been worth a fortune. Fortunately he had dropped it on the moor side, not into the courtyard where it might have brained someone.
“Good riddance!” the big man huffed. “Want to try a chair or two, Sister? I think I’ll enjoy the loveseat next. Hideous thing! Should be good for—”
The turret room exploded. Caught on the threshold, Ambrose recoiled from the blast of heat, throwing up his arms to shield his face. Flames and smoke poured out the windows and door, and up into the sky. Emerald was out of the direct line of fire, but the accompanying wave of sorcery was stunning. She screamed and stepped back. She might well have fallen to her death had the King’s meaty paw not grabbed her wrist.
He tried to go around the tower toward the Observatory, but flames blasting from the window blocked the walkway.
“I think we shall proceed in this direction,” he growled, doing so and towing her behind him. He marched out onto the curtain wall.
She looked back in dismay. The whole tower had become an inferno, sending flames leaping high into the night. Golden light illuminated all of Ironhall and a billowing cloud overhead; even the snowy tors in the distance glowed amber. The Queen’s Tower must collapse very shortly and the rest of First House would follow. Without the King’s childish decision to trash furniture, both he and Emerald would be mere cinders by now.
Was that true? There was more to that sorcery than just an incendiary spell.
Ambrose had a very complex personality, but the experts at Oakendown were satisfied that his dominant elements were earth and chance. “A human landslide,” they called him. Like Emerald, therefore, he must dislike heights, but he showed no signs of nervousness as he plodded purposefully along that narrow catwalk toward the bath house. It was a tight fit—his right elbow brushed the merlons and his left overhung the drop to the courtyard.
They were far enough from the tower now that distance had weakened the maddening scream of magic in her head. “Sire, stop! Your Grace, there is no way out at that end!”
The King halted and turned to scowl at her. He seemed to have taken no damage from the explosion, although she had seen him bathed in flame in the doorway. “You are sure?”
“Yes, sire. The turrets are dummies. There is no walkway behind the merlons.” The idea of Ambrose running up and down pitched roofs like a cat was not tenable. It hashed the mind.
“That fire is behaving oddly,” he rumbled, staring past her at the inferno. “It is not making as much noise as it should. Why has that turret not collapsed yet?”
“Because the fire is not real. It’s illusion!”
“It felt real.”
“But it isn’t.”
“So we walked into a trap? Our opponent maneuvered us into doing exactly what he wanted?”
She did not need to answer. A man strolled casually out through the wall of flames and proceeded along the top of the curtain wall towards them. He carried a sword, flicking it up and down as if to limber his wrist. Firelight glinted on his silvery cloak.
25
Rampage on the Ramparts
“IF THAT FIRE IS SORCEROUS,” KING AMBROSE muttered, “then the Blades’ bindings will resist it. We must play for time until they find a way through. Meanwhile, there is no need for suicidal heroics.” Backing into a crenel, he grasped Emerald’s arm and effortlessly moved her past him, then emerged between her and the assassin. She did not resist, for he was right—she would do no good being a human shield. Besides, even cats would not try wrestling on this catwalk.
Although she was trying not to look down, she knew that the courtyard was full of spectators, with more spilling out of every doorway. Horrified faces were staring up at the spectacle so brightly lit by the inferno.
“Good evening, King!” the assassin called cheerfully. He was still sauntering slowly toward them, as if he were enjoying himself too much to hurry. “Or morning in exactitude. Chilly
for the time of year, I comprehend.”
“Commander Bandit warned me you were a show-off.” Ambrose was quietly backing away, keeping the distance between them constant and forcing Emerald to retreat toward the bath house.
“The wise physician trumpets his cures and buries his mistakes in silence. I bury my successes, but not without public demonstration.”
“Then you did not arrange this meeting for the purpose of negotiation?”
“Whatever to negotiate?” Silvercloak conveyed surprise, although his face was shadowed and indistinct against the fire.
“Release of your fellow conspirators, perhaps?”
He laughed. His voice was high-pitched for a man, yet Emerald had trouble imagining any woman displaying that sort of uncaring homicidal arrogance. Although he had no accent, he used an odd choice of words, which was typical of persons who had been conjured to speak a foreign tongue.
“After your inquisitors have completed with them? What purpose are they for, then? Likewise, they were unvalued to me anyway. They paid. I kill. I collect.”
Something bounced off his cloak. He ignored it. Men and boys in the courtyard were throwing things at him—books, pots, bottles, tools—with no apparent effect except a few yells of pain from below, as the debris bounced back on the crowd. Younger boys were racing back and forth to the buildings, fetching ammunition. Pliers struck a merlon and clattered down on the walkway, joining a candlestick and a hair-brush. Unfortunately Ironhall taught no courses in archery.
“You must survive to collect,” the King growled, continuing to ease back. “You really think you can get away from here alive?”
“Oh, yes! Did you ever appraise I could get in?”
“No. I’m very impressed. Shall we talk about a king’s ransom? Would you like to be my Grand Inquisitor? A peerage, plus ten times what the Skuldigger gang paid you.”
Silvercloak chuckled and shook his head. “I must contemplate my professional reputation. An honest crook stays bought. Kings rarely do.”
Ambrose stopped moving and folded his arms. He had reached roughly the middle of the curtain wall and seemingly decided to retreat no farther. “I compliment you on your ethics. You will allow my companion to leave in peace, though?”
“Alas! My condolences to the boy, but he may seek to interfere with my departure.”
“But this is no boy—”
“Excuse me,” said a voice near Emerald’s ankle. “Move the King back a pace or two, will you?”
She did not quite leap to her death in shock, but obviously the stress had driven her insane. That could not really be that familiar face down there peering up at her.
“Of course,” she mumbled, and poked a well-upholstered royal loin. “Move back three steps, sire. Right away.”
Ambrose did not stop lecturing the assassin on the moral depravity of killing innocent women, but he did resume his deliberate backing up. As soon as he had cleared the crenel, Wart scrambled up on the catwalk, rose to his feet facing Silvercloak, and drew his rapier.
The spectators’ cheers echoed off the buildings and from the distant hills. From knights to sopranos, they screamed with joy. He was recognized, and shouts of “Wart! Wart!” spread through the crowd. Perhaps sharp eyes even made out the gleam of the cat’s-eye on Sleight’s pommel.
They were seeing the King’s salvation. Emerald saw a friend about to die. They did not know about Chefney and Demise. Even the great Durendal had admitted he had never fenced like Silvercloak.
Of course he could not swarm up stone walls like a human ant, either. How had Wart managed this miraculous arrival?
“Bless my celebrated eyebrows!” the assassin said. “What have we here? Last week you were a carrot boy. Yesterday you collected animal excretion. And today you’re a swordsman. What are you really?”
“I’m a swordsman,” Wart said. “But you aren’t.”
“Back,” Ambrose grunted. “Must give him room.” He renewed his retreat, driving Emerald behind him.
Wart said quietly, “No. Stay there for now, please.”
“I manage in humble fashion.” Silvercloak swished his rapier up and down a few times. He was left-handed after all, although Emerald thought he had been carrying the sword in his right hand earlier. Perhaps he was ambidextrous. He resumed his slow approach.
“No.” Wart did some swishing of his own. He stepped forward two paces and halted. “You killed Chefney and Demise. They were friends of mine, so I dedicate your death to their memory.” He raised his sword in a brief salute and went back to guard. “That made us all think of you as a swordsman, but we were wrong. You’re not. You are only a sorcerer.”
“Only? I never saw a sorcerer kneel in the dung of a stable yard.”
“Nor yet a Blade. It was a regrettable expedient.” Pompous talk was not Wart’s style, so what was he up to? Was he playing Ambrose’s game, dragging it out until the Blades could come? Even if the duel was a foregone conclusion, he could reasonably hope to delay Silvercloak a few seconds. That might be long enough to save his King if the Guard was on its way. The illusory fire in the tower was faltering, shooting green and even purple flames at times. It had stopped making any sound at all.
Silvercloak halted his approach when he was close enough to launch an attack. The barrage of missiles had stopped.
Wart had his left side to the merlons and his sword arm clear. That should be the better position on this parapet, but the advantage canceled out because Silvercloak was left-handed. Being left-handed was itself an advantage, Emerald knew. Right-handed swordsmen found few chances to practice against southpaws, while southpaws could always find right-handers.
“I worked it out on the ride here,” Wart said. “It’s pretty obvious now. The door in Quirk Row was the first clue, of course. And at Holmgarth I had a score of men in that yard looking for you. I had described you exactly. I gave them the signal that you were there, and some of them were watching the gate. Yet you rode right past them.”
For the first time Emerald thought the assassin hesitated, as if re-appraising his opponent. “I have a very unremarkable face.”
“Very. And the dog tonight—that was the clincher. You fence as a southpaw—usually. Tell you what, messer Argènteo,” Wart said brightly, “why don’t you drop that cloak of yours and we’ll make an honest fight of this?”
The assassin’s laugh sounded a trifle forced. “I think not. If you have gotten that far, young man, then you are smarter than you look, but you also know that your case is hopeless. Why die so young?”
“I won’t die. I will avenge my friends. Come on, then, killer! Two hundred thousand ducats await if you can get past me: Stalwart of the Blades. I say you can’t.”
Silvercloak did not move.
This time it was Wart who laughed. He raised his voice in a shout to the audience below—and certainly no one in the Guard could play to a gallery better than he could, with his minstrel background. “Brothers! There’s a horse down in the Quarry. It’s in some sort of trance and there may be warding spells on it, but that’s how this Blade-killer intends to escape. If you hurry—”
Silvercloak leaped and lunged, a fast appel. Wart parried without riposting. He parried the next stroke, too, not moving his feet. And the next. The swords flickered and clinked with no apparent result. Then stillness. The contestants stood frozen in place, the tips of their rapiers just touching, eyes locked.
No blood had been shed, but the spectators whooped and cheered. The experts clearly thought Wart had shown the better form. The juniors were almost hysterical with excitement.
“That the best you can do, messer? That wasn’t how you treated Sir Demise and Sir Chefney! The fire behind you is turning a most sickly color. I think the Blades will be here soon.”
When the killer made no answer, Wart raised his voice again, never taking his eyes off Silvercloak.
“Your Majesty! If I may presume, sire. There is a cord tied around the merlon behind me. It holds up a rope ladder, w
hich this man expects to be his escape route. If you would be so gracious as to—”
Silvercloak lunged again, his rapier a blur of firelight. Steel rattled against steel.
Someone—it must have been Wart, although it did not sound like him—screamed piercingly. It was certainly Wart who pitched headlong through the crenel and went hurtling down to the jagged rocks of the Quarry, far below.
26
Finale
AS A SKILLED TUMBLER, HE TWISTED AROUND IN the air. He landed on his feet with hardly more jolt than from jumping off a stool. By luck or magic, he had found a tiny patch of turf between two vicious rocky teeth.
He had guessed right.
Someone had to die after that fall. Although it was not he, the mental shock was considerable. He needed a minute to catch his breath, and several minutes before his heart stopped woodpeckering his ribs. It was easy enough for a rank amateur to spin fancy theories about the way Silvercloak’s sorcery worked when all the experts in the kingdom were stumped. Gambling his life on such wild notions had been rank insanity. But it had been necessary, and it was going to change a lot of things.
The horse was still there, a few rocks over, saddled and frozen in place, waiting for a rider who now would never come. Master of Rituals might know how to de-spell it. Meanwhile, the night was still cold and the light from the blazing tower was dwindling fast. Stalwart slid Sleight through his belt and began picking his way over to the rope ladder. He had some scores to settle: Rufus, Grand Master, Nicely….
As he stepped on the first rung, the fire over-head went out. Good chance and bad chance always evened out in the end, they said. Had that blaze in the tower started a few minutes later than it had, he would have been past the ladder, fighting his way toward the bath house end of the wall. As it was, the first thing he had seen in the sudden glare had been the horse. Guessing why it was there, he had looked for a ladder and found one. As he neared the top, he had heard the King’s voice.