by David Drake
Ilna stepped back into the yard. She glanced at the rough straw mat in her hand, then showed it to the wild girl.
“North and then northwest,” Alecto said. Her face wrinkled in a thunderous frown. “How did you do this?” she demanded. “I can see the directions in it, but there's nothing here really!”
“Hush,” said Ilna curtly.
The fat stablemaster had worked his way back through the crowd with a clerk and two soldiers in tow. “There's the other one!” he said to the clerk. “She was trying to hide in the stables!”
Under the gate arch, the inn's residents were giving their names to clerks while the priestess looked on. She pointed to the innkeeper, come from the main building in a nightshirt and cap. “I know Master Reddick by sight,” she said. “Stamp him and then the ones he can vouch for.”
“I went to get my outer tunic,” Ilna said coldly, her eyes on the clerk as if the stablemaster were beneath her notice. “We have nothing to hide.”
“Don't you?” the clerk sneered. “That's for me to decide, I think. Now, who are you?”
In his left hand was a notebook made of four thin leaves of birchwood bound with leather straps. The ink-filled tip of a cow horn dangled from a hook in his tunic collar, and he held a short quill between his right thumb and forefinger.
“My name's Ilna,” Ilna said. She tossed the straw back into the stable behind her; it had served its purpose, now that she'd read its message. “My kinswoman here is Alecto. We're from Barca's Hamlet.”
The soldiers watched Alecto with more than causal interest. One of them shifted his left arm slightly, as if ready to throw his small, round shield in the way of any attack the wild girl made.
“Barca's Hamlet?” the clerk repeated. “I never heard of the place.”
Ilna shrugged. The only thing she'd feared was that the fellow somehow had heard of Barca's Hamlet—and therefore knew it was on Haft.
“It's north and west of here,” she said. “We came to Donelle at the Mistress' summons.”
“North and...” the stablemaster said. A deep frown furrowed his forehead. He glared at Alecto. “You come from the hills? You didn't tell me that!”
“You might've known by looking at her,” the clerk said, his nose wrinkling. “They're mostly animals up there. And not”—he turned his attention from Alecto back to Ilna—“many worship the Mistress.”
“There's some of us,” Ilna said, making sure that her tone carried the cold contempt she really felt for this functionary. The Mistress's service had no monopoly on his sort, jumped-up little worms who felt their slight authority made them important people. “Do you object?”
The clerk must have heard a threat in the words—and felt it might be justified. “What?” he said. “Of course not. Well, you'll report to...”
He paused, flipping back to the outer leaf of his notebook, then realizing there wasn't enough light to read it by without a lantern. “Well, I know there isn't a gathering place for people from the hills. You'll have to go the temple and ask them there. I'll give you an escort.”
Ilna sniffed. “We can find the temple,” she said curtly. “We have on past nights, after all.”
Before the clerk could object, she added, “Come along, Alecto,” and started for the gate across the inn yard. She nodded respectfully to the soldiers as she passed. One of them nodded back, but the men kept their eyes primarily on Alecto.
Someone had lit a stick of lightwood from the oven and stuck its base through the iron harness loop of an upturned wagon tongue. The flame threw a flaring, yellowish light across the inn yard.
A line had formed in the yard's forecourt. Clerks jotted information onto wax or wooden tablets, then divided the people into two groups. Those whose identity wasn't sufficiently guaranteed went out into the street, sometimes pausing first to don clothing for public wear. The others joined a separate group in front of the priestess herself in the gateway.
Ilna didn't want to call attention to herself by making eye contact, but as she neared the gate she saw the priestess touch a stamp to the cook's forehead, then press it into a pot of ochre again. The red pigment outlined a fat-bodied web spider whose forelegs spread in an encompassing arc.
Ilna started, then lowered her eyes and sidled past. She expected the cook to snarl something at her, but the woman wore a nervous expression and didn't seem to have noticed Ilna's presence. She looked as tense as if the mark on her forehead was a real spider.
The waiting soldiers didn't block the gateway, but they narrowed it considerably. Ilna waited for a pair of teamsters to go through ahead of her so that she didn't brush the cuirass of the man to the left. He gave her a speculative look, to which she responded coldly.
The disciples of Moon Wisdom seemed a straitlaced lot; in that at least Ilna felt kinship with them. The soldiers, however, weren't locals and apparently weren't followers of the faith either. They reacted to Ilna in the fashion she'd come to expect from young men with weapons or some other reason to feel full of themselves.
The lantern and burning pine knot hadn't made the inn yard very bright, but the street was darker still, especially where overhanging eaves shadowed the cobblestones. The teamsters turned to the right, the direction that Ilna wanted to go. She stepped away from the gate and paused, letting the others get farther ahead for privacy.
“Did you see that spider?” Alecto said. “Though I suppose it's what you'd expect from people who call out the Pack.”
“I saw it,” Ilna said without emphasis. She was interested to realize that the spider symbol had affected her companion as well. There was more to it than a smudge of ochre, though she couldn't have said what the added difference was.
In a less distant tone she went on, “I don't think we dare stay in Donelle if they're searching for us this way. We'll get out through the north gate and go on, the way the pattern indicated.”
“I still don't know how you did that,” Alecto muttered grudgingly. “All it was was a few wisps of straw, but when I looked at it I saw the road through the gates we left by last night.”
“You don't need to know,” Ilna said. The teamsters had disappeared beyond the jutting corner of the second building down the street. She set off after them.
“Faugh!” Alecto said, glaring at the pavement as she strode along beside Ilna. “The only thing worse would be crossing the lava barrens sunwise of Hartrag's village. The rock here doesn't cut like lava, I'll give it that, but half of it's covered with slime so slick we might as well be walking on ice.”
Ilna sniffed. She almost asked what "lava barrens" were, but she decided that she didn't want to give Alecto the satisfaction of knowing something Ilna herself didn't. Instead she said, “If the people in the hills don't worship this Mistress, then we can hope that they'll hide us if the disciples come searching. Though I don't think they'll bother looking for us if we're no longer in Donelle and a direct danger to them.”
That left the problem of Ilna getting her information back to Carus and the others in Valles, but she'd learned long ago to take matters one at a time. First she had to avoid being caught and disemboweled by the disciples of Moon Wisdom.
Alecto muttered, out of sorts and perhaps frightened by the twisting streets and stone buildings. In a louder voice she said, “I've hunted in canebrakes where the paths were straighter! How can people live like this?”
Ilna, who hated stone so much that she'd almost have preferred to walk on knives than on these streets, smiled coldly. “We'll be outside soon,” she said.
“They closed the gates,” Alecto said, her voice sharpened by the undertone of condescension she'd heard in Ilna's words. “We won't be able to walk straight out like we did last night.”
“We'll manage,” Ilna said. Her fingers were plaiting cords as she walked along. She wished she had some long straws snatched from the stable instead, because for this purpose she was working in a larger scale than she usually did. Her cords were short, no more than two fingers' lengths apiece, so s
he had to weave several to manage the effect she wanted.
She smiled harshly again. As she'd said to the wild girl: they'd manage.
A family—father, mother, three children, and at the end of the line a servant—passed them going in the opposite direction. At their head was a minor temple official whose lantern lighted his own way, not that of those he was guiding. He looked irritated; they were nervous and uncertain.
Ilna glared at the guide, then found her gaze softening as she met the eyes of the woman carrying her youngest in a sling of coarse cloth. They didn't know anyone in Donelle but one another, so they'd been roused from sleep and led off to a collection center for strangers from their district with no idea of when they'd be released. The children, already tired and whining, would be a shrieking burden long before then.
The Mistress and Her Children didn't care. Ilna supposed she needn't care either, since these people were part of the reason the Pack were loose to hunt in Carus' dreams.
She and Alecto came around a bend in the street which brought them into sight of the wall. The city gate had been closed, apparently with some difficulty. A freshly attached length of hawser ran diagonally from the upper hinge of one of the leaves, lifting the opposite corner so that it didn't sag into the ground and lock the panel open.
A dozen armed men stood in a morose circle in front of the gateway. They were militia, probably members of the night watch called out for this special duty. Close by were a trio of mercenaries, bulky fair-skinned armsmen from Blaise. There was a watchtower, but if its floors were in the same condition as the gate, Ilna understood why the guards weren't in it.
Both groups watched the women approach. The civilians looked worried; the attitude of the soldiers was more generally speculative, though Ilna noticed the senior man lifted his broad-bladed sword a finger's breadth in the sheath to make sure wouldn't bind if he needed to draw it suddenly.
One of the civilians held a lantern hanging from the crossbar of a pole. The lamp had at least two wicks, but the dirty parchment lenses passed only a yellowish glow. Ilna frowned as she walked closer, wondering if there'd be as much light as she needed.
Alecto walked a half step behind. She didn't touch the horned hilt of her dagger, but Ilna could smell murderous tension in the wild girl's sweat. Alecto might fly into berserk slaughter at any moment, driven mostly by fear. Against so many armed men, the result was a foregone conclusion.
“What are you doing here?” said a militiaman in a bronze cuirass, his voice rising a note on every syllable. His full white moustache flared into his sideburns. “You haven't been marked!”
Each of the militiamen had the spider stamping in the middle of his forehead, though the helmets of several of the men partly covered the symbol. The speaker wore real body armor and a number of the others had cowhide vests, which they obviously hoped would turn an edge. They looked more threatened than threatening.
“No, we haven't,” Ilna said in a clear voice. The knotted pattern was a ball in her left palm. “Hold that lantern up, and I'll show you why.”
The guards were all staring at her. The three professionals moved around to the side so that they had a clear view without being blocked by the militia.
Ilna nodded, gesturing them closer. When she thought everyone could see what she was doing, she reached down with her right hand and pulled the pattern open in the light.
The guards went down like lightning-struck sheep in a clatter of equipment and dropped weapons. They were stunned, not dead, but it would be hours before they regained their senses. The lantern broke on the pavement, spilling oil that blazed into soft flame.
The old man in the cuirass had fallen only to his knees. He pawed his eyes with his left hand and made choking noises. Bad vision had saved him from the pattern's full impact.
Alecto knelt over him, her dagger out. Ilna dropped her cords and caught Alecto's shoulder; she couldn't reach the knife wrist. Alecto twisted and slit the old man's throat to the spine. Blood gouted onto the cobblestones, black in the light of burning oil.
Ilna picked up the pattern and began to unknot it as a way of occupying her fingers. She was afraid of what she might do to her companion if she let her control slip.
“There's a wicket gate in the main panel,” Ilna said coldly. “Help me get it open.”
She put the cords in her sleeve and stepped to the city gate. A door small enough that she'd have to hunch to pass through it was set in the center of the right leaf. Ilna slid the drawbolt open, but the sagging frame kept her from pushing the wicket open.
Alecto slammed the butt of a watchman's spear into the panel. It sprang ajar. Alecto stuck the shaft into the crack and levered the door fully open.
She smiled at Ilna. “Are we going out or aren't we?” she said.
“Yes,” said Ilna. Her mind was white with fury, but she'd spent most of her life angry, so she knew how to control the emotion. She slipped through the doorway, out of Donelle.
On the pavement behind lay the ring of guards, their eyes open. They were breathing as heavily as sleeping seals; all but the man in the bronze cuirass, whose feet had just ceased to drum the cobblestones.
Garric swung to the top of the wall and found Lord Thalemos squatting there. “Where's the ladder down?” Thalemos cried.
A watchman with a cudgel and a whirling rattle stood calling over his shoulder to people Garric couldn't see around the curve of the wall. Probably it was a detachment of Protectors, summoned from the guardhouse at the front of the enclosure. More Protectors were coming down the street from the other direction, their spears raised to strike.
“Jump, you fool!” Garric snarled. Thalemos goggled at him, then leaped down without looking. He'd have belly-flopped on the pavement if Toster hadn't been there to catch him.
Garric jumped also, angry at the world and particularly at himself. He'd let his fury out at Thalemos, who was guilty of nothing worse than having lived a normal life which hadn't fitted him for slaughter and prison breaks. Between Garric's tone and the bloody sword in his hand, the rescued prisoner had almost broken his neck in fright.
And if that had happened, what would Tint's death have been worth?
A javelin flickered in the air. The leading Protector, still twenty yards down the street, threw up his hands and fell backward. Prada stood on the roof of the building where the gang was hiding. He cocked another missile. The surviving Protectors ducked for shelter in doorways.
Garric followed his group across the street and into the shop. Toster half helped, half carried Thalemos. Garric tried to sheathe his sword, but the curved blade and memory of Tint's cracking bones kept him from finding the mouth of the scabbard.
Metron was jabbering demands in his squeaky mental voice. It was with an effort of will that Garric managed not to smash the crystal between his heel and the cobblestones.
Halophus and Mersrig slammed, then barred the shop door behind Garric, the last to enter. The panel wouldn't withstand a determined burglar, let alone a military assault.
Vascay stood at the door of the inner room, gesturing Garric through tight-faced. The wizard lay on the littered floor, his head pillowed on a rolled-up cloak. Yellow lamplight helped turn Metron's complexion sallow, but Garric had seen corpses laid out for burial with more apparent life in them.
“Put the amulet on my chest!” Metron's voice said. “Quickly, now!”
Garric slipped off the silver chain and set it with the crystal on Metron's chest. He was surprised at how much lighter he felt; the amulet's psychic weight was greater than he'd realized.
The tiny figure of light within the crystal vanished. The wizard's lungs swelled. He lurched upright, snorting like a man saved from drowning. Looking around wildly, he shouted, “Lord Thalemos! Is Lord Thalemos all right?”
Heavy objects hammered the shop door. Wood splintered, followed by a scream.
“Who's next?” Hame cried in a high voice. “Who else wants to die for the Intercessor?”
“He
's all right,” Vascay snarled, “but he won't be long if we don't get out of here. Come on! You swore you could get us free!”
“Yes, but bring him here,” Metron said, crossing his legs shakily. He'd drawn a circle of power on the grimy floor before going into the trance. Now he moved the oil lamp into the center of the figure and took the athame from under his sash.
Garric started for the main room. Vascay waved him back. “Stay with this one,” he said. “I'll send the boy in.”
Over his shoulder, he muttered, “I've seen enough wizardry for the night—and for a lifetime!”
Metron ignored him. He held the sapphire ring between his left thumb and forefinger, then dipped the athame in his other hand over the words written about the circle.
“Rexi,” he chanted. “Thorexi hipporexi...”
The candle guttered—but not, as Garric first thought, because the wizard's movements were fanning it. The flame pinched in and expanded the way ale spurts from a full barrel, sucking the bunghole closed and reopening rhythmically. The light grew brighter but took on the chill red tinge of wizardry.
“Maskelo,” said Metron. “Maskelon maskelouphron.”
Thalemos came into the room, wearing a more settled expression than Garric had previously seen on his face. The boy had been snatched from his cell and carried through a chaos that would've disconcerted anybody facing it cold; no wonder he'd seemed dazed most of the time. Now that Garric looked back on the events of the night, he marveled at the thought he'd really been involved in that.
“You wanted me, sir?” Thalemos asked Garric.
Garric hooked his thumb at Metron. “He did,” he said. “I think he just wanted to be sure you were safe.”
“Besro, uphro, bolbeoch!” Metron said. He held out the ring in his left hand so that the jewel glittered in the wizardlight.
There'd been a pause in the noise from the front room. Now there was a crash that must have been the main shutter giving way, followed instantly by the shriek of steel on steel. A man cried out on a rising note.