As it was, he had no choice.
And he had a good chance of succeeding: he'd asked Ischade to come alone-she had her own bones to pick with Roxane; he'd requisitioned enough incendiaries from Marc's illicit store to send all of Sanctuary up in flames. And his men knew how to use them. The trick was getting Sync out of there before firing up the witchy-roast.
Randal, their Tysian wizard, was sneaking around in mongoose form, right now, taking care of Roxane's snakes and reconnoitering the premises.
When they saw a hawk fly over, right to left, they'd light the horseshoe-shaped fire they'd prepared and rush the place: twenty mounted fighters ought to be able to do the job.
The horses were hooded, their blinders soaked with soda water. The men had bladders of it on their saddles, to wet bandanas if the smoke got too thick.
Ischade was still beside him, in a meditative pose, whatever magic she was going to field unrevealed.
She just waited, tiny and delicate and too pale in the light of day, her claret robe pulled tight about her like a child in her mother's clothes.
"You can still walk away from this," Strat assured her with a gallantry he didn't really feel. "It's not your fight."
"Is it not? It's yours, then?" Up rose Ischade, and suddenly she was terrifying, not small any longer, not the petite, sensual creature he'd brought here.
Her eyes were hellish and growing so large he thought he might be sucked inside them; he recalled their first encounter, long ago, on a dark slum street, when he'd been with Crit and they'd seen those eyes floating over a teenage corpse.
He found he couldn't answer; he just shook his head.
The power that was Ischade bared its teeth at him, the kill-fervor there as sharp as any Stepson's-or any night-mad wolf's. "I'll bring you your man. All of this"-Ischade spread a robed arm, and it was as if night split the day- "that you do is unnecessary. She owes me a person, and more. Wait here, you, and soon you'll see."
"Sure thing, Ischade." Strat found himself squatting down, digging in the sod with his brush-cutting knife. "I'll be right here."
He must have blinked, or looked away, or something- the next he knew, she was gone, and a hawk's baby-cry resounded overhead, and men set their fires and ran for their horses.
Vaulting up on his bay, he wondered if Ischade was right-if he didn't need to risk all this manpower, if magic- hers and Randal's-alone could win the day.
He didn't like to think that way; he was used to letting Crit do his tactical thinking for him; in times like this, a man who was half a Sacred Band pair sorely missed his partner.
And so, thinking more about who was absent than who was present, he urged his horse into a lope and sought the firegate, not realizing until a shape hovered in midair beside him that Randal, on a cloud-effigy of a horse, had drawn alongside.
"In her witching room, he is!" Randal shouted, his face white beneath its blanket of freckles. "And he's yet salvageable, if we can get him out. But it won't be easy- he's totally entranced. I couldn't rouse him in my mongoose form. I'll seek my power globe now and do my best. Fare well, Straton! May the Writ protect us all!"
And his nonhorse thundered away on unhooves.
Craziest damn way to run a war! Strat had come back to Sanctuary to get away from just this sort of thing.
The firewall, around him hot and snapping, gave matters the immediacy of battle, the plain-and-simple truth of life and death.
The fire was just a little out of control, and his horse had to leap hot flames. Within, sod was beginning to smoke and combust, sparks flew, men yelled and squirted water on themselves and their mounts as they let fly with flaming arrows and urged skittish horses toward Roxane's front door.
Strat's plan was to ride roughshod right into Roxane's house, snatch Sync, and get out before she could bewitch them.
It wasn't a plan such as his partner might have made, and he was aware that he might rescue one soldier only to lose another-or others-to Roxane, but he had to do something.
Just as he'd finally convinced his horse of this, and was ready to lead his reformed group up her smoking stairs, an apparition appeared in the doorway: Ischade stood there, with Sync, his arm over her shoulder, and they walked calmly out onto the veranda and down the steps, onto a lawn spurting sparks and young flames.
Men whooped and raced toward her. Sync, beside her, looked around calmly, his brow knitted as if a slightly amusing problem had him distracted.
Strat, wondering if he was dreaming-if it could really be this easy-got there fast, and with Ischade's help pulled Sync up behind him on the horse.
The fire was loud, and hot, and the horses and men milling around them made talk nearly impossible. But Strat bellowed to the man next to him: "Put her up before you. Let's get out of here!"
The Stepson's mouth formed the word: "Who?"
Strat looked back down, and Ischade was gone. So he gave the signal to end the sack, and with Sync holding tight to his waist, aimed his sweating horse at a narrowing portal in the flames.
In the thick of Downwind, it was nearly dusk, but the flames from the southeast made a second sunset which wouldn't die.
Zip was in a twilight all his own, stumbling from sewer to alley to dungheap, one hand against his bleeding side, nearly doubled over from the pain.
He'd been stabbed before, beaten often, starved and fevered in the course of life, but never so close to death as this.
He'd pulled the barbed missile out; he didn't understand why it hurt worse now, not less.
He was sick to his stomach and only intermittently did he recall his determination to get home. Home to his own safe haven, or home to Mama Becho's, where someone would tend him, home to... anywhere where he could lie down, where the Beysibs or the Stepsons or the 3rd Commando or the army wouldn't find him.
He was sweating and he was thirsty and he was nauseated. There was a red film before his eyes that made it hard to tell which comer he was on.
If he was lost in Downwind, he was nearly dead: he knew those streets like he knew the tunnels, the sewers... the sewers. If he could find a rat-hole, he could curl up in one; he didn't want to die in public. That thought, and that alone, kept him on his feet just long enough for him to stumble into Ratfall, where people knew him.
He heard his name called, but he was down on his knees by then, with his head between them. The only thing he could do was curl up before he passed out.
When he woke he was under blankets; there was a cool cloth on his head.
When he could he reached up and grabbed the hand there, held tight to someone's wrist.
He opened his eyes, and a face swam, unrecognizable above him. A voice from that direction said, "Don't try to talk. The worst is over. You'll be all right if you just drink this."
Something was pushed between his lips-hard like clay or metal; it grated on his teeth. Then his head was raised by another's will and liquid spilled down his throat.
He choked, sputtered, then remembered how to swallow. When he couldn't swallow more, someone wiped his lips and then his chin.
"Good, good boy," he heard. Then he slept a sleep in which his side burned and flamed and he kept trying to put the fire out, but it kept starting up from ashes, and his body walked away from him, leaving him invisible and lonely on a deserted Downwind street.
When he woke again, he smelled something: chicken.
He opened his eyes, and the room didn't spin. He tried to sit up, and then it did.
Voices mumbled just beyond earshot, and then a form bent over him. Long black hair brushed his cheek.
"That's a good one; here you go, drink this," said a blurry face.
He did, and well-being surged through him. Then his vision cleared, and he saw whose face it was: the lady fighter, Kama of the 3rd Commando, was tending him. Behind her, the soldier-mage Randal craned his swanlike neck and rubbed his hands.
"Better, you're right, Kama," said the mage judiciously, and then: "I'll leave you. If you need me, I'll be ri
ght outside."
As the door closed and he was alone with his enemy, Zip tried to push himself up on his arms. He didn't have the strength. He wanted to run, but he couldn't even raise his head. He'd heard all about Straton's skill at interrogation. He'd have been better off dead in the street than being alive and at the mercy of such as these.
She sat on the bed next to him and took his hand.
He tensed, thinking: Now it will begin. Torture. Drugs. They've saved me one death to offer me another.
She said, "I've wanted to do this ever since I first saw you." Leaning close, she kissed him on the lips.
When she sat up straight, she smiled.
He didn't have the energy to ask her what she had in mind for him, or what the kiss was meant to mean; he couldn't find his voice.
But she said: "It was a mistake. Gayle didn't understand what you were trying to do. We're all sorry. You just relax and get better. We'll take care of you. I'll take care of you. If you can hear me, blink."
He blinked. If Kama of the 3rd Commando wanted to take care of him, he wasn't in any condition to argue.
DAUGHTER OF THE SUN by Robin W. Bailey
"Did you miss me?"
Kadakithis whirled away from his window at the sound of that voice and stared in mute disbelief at the young woman in his doorway. She moved through his apartment toward him, aswirl in a summer cloud of dazzling white silks and shimmering sun-drenched hair. Smiling, she reached out to embrace him.
"Cousin!" They squeezed each other until they were breathless, then the Prince held her back at arm's length and laughed. "Gods, how yor've changed!" He made her turn while he rubbed his chin with mock-seriousness. "Chenaya, favorite of favorites, you were lovely even before I left Ranke, but you've grown positively exquisite." His fingers traced a thin, pale scar barely noticeable against the deep bronze of her left forearm. "Still playing rough, I see."
He clucked his tongue chidingly and sighed. "But what are you doing in Sanctuary, cousin? Did your father come with you?"
It was Chenaya's turn to laugh, and the sound rolled silver-sweet in her throat. "Still my Little Prince," she managed finally, patting his head as if he were a puppy in her lap. "Impetuous and impatient as ever. So many questions!"
"Not so little anymore, my dear," he answered, patting her head in the same condescending manner. "I'm taller than you now."
"Not by so very much." She spun away, her gown billowing with the movement. "Perhaps we should wrestle to see if it makes any difference?" She regarded him from across the room, her head tilting slightly when he didn't reply. A silence grew between them as he studied her, brief but suddenly more than she could bear. She crossed the apartment again in swift strides and seized his hands in hers. "It's so very good to see you, my Little Prince."
Their arms slipped about each other, and they embraced again. But this time his touch was different, distant. She backed off, slipping gently from his grasp, and gazed up at his face, at the eyes that suddenly colored with tints of sadness, or something just as disturbing.
Could he know the news from the capital?
"I smelled a garden when I entered the grounds," she said, tugging his hand, urging him toward the door. It struck her now how dark his quarters seemed, how sparse and empty of warmth or light. "Let's go for a walk. The sun is bright and beautiful."
Kadakithis started to follow, then hesitated. His gaze fixed on something beyond her shoulder; his hand in hers turned cold, stiff with tension. She felt his trembling. Slowly, she turned to see what affected him so.
Four men, guards apparently, stood just beyond his threshold. She had noticed several like them as she passed through the palace-strange, blank-eyed men of a racial type unknown to her. She'd been so eager to see her cousin, she had paid little attention. She'd assumed them to be mercenaries or hirelings. She took note of their garb and the weapons they wore, and hid a private smirk. A man would have to be good with his steel to dress in such a tasteless, gaudy fashion.
One of the four clapped the haft of a pike on the floor stones, needlessly announcing their presence. "The Beysa requests that Your Highness join her on the West Terrace." Then, Chenaya's confusion gave way to a flush of anger as the guard looked directly at her and added with more than a hint of insolence, "At once."
Kadakithis carefully slipped his hand from hers and swallowed. With a shrug of resignation he drew himself up and the tension appeared to melt from him. "Where are you staying, cousin? There are quarters in the Summer Palace if you need them. And I must prepare a party to celebrate your arrival; I know how you love parties." He shot the guard commander a haughty glance as he lingered over this small talk, but he took a first step toward the door.
His expression begged her indulgence; more, it warned her to it. She watched, brows wrinkling, as he moved away from her. "My father has purchased an estate just beyond your Avenue of Temples. The lands reach all the way to the Red Foal River. The papers are being finalized at this very moment." She pushed the small talk, forcing the Prince to defer his exit, studying with a subtle eye the guards' minute reactions. Whoever this Beysa was, these were certainly her men. And who was she, indeed, to command sentries within a palace of a Rankan royal governor?
The Prince nodded, drifting farther away. "Good land can be had cheaply these days," he observed. "How is Lowan Vigeles?"
"Loyal as ever," she said pointedly. What the hell is going on? was the message her expression conveyed. Are you in trouble? "Though somewhat tired. We made the journey with only eight servants. Protectors, really. Gladiators from my father's school. I handpicked them myself."
Kadakithis pursed his lips ever so slightly to acknowledge her offer. If they were from Lowan's school, better fighters could not be found, and she had placed them at his service. "Go home and give Lowan my well-wishes. I'll need time to plan your party, but I'll send you a message." He turned to join the four guards who barely hid their impatience or their indignation at being made to wait. But he stopped once more. "Oh, have you seen Molin, yet?"
She frowned, then put on a very wide, very forced smile. "I wanted to delay that unpleasantry and visit a friend first."
The smile that spread on the Prince's face was genuine; she'd learned to read his moods in early childhood. "Don't be so hard on the old priest. He's been a great comfort to me, always full of"-he hesitated, and a twinkle sparked in his eyes-"advice."
"Maybe I'll see him," she agreed, running her hands over her bare shoulders, down her arms, feeling somewhat naked and alone as Kadakithis went through the door and out of the apartments.
Two of the fish-eyed sentries remained. "Would you accompany us, please."
Polite words, but she sensed there was no courtesy in them. She shook back her hair, batted her lashes, lifted her nose to a neck-straining angle, and walked over the threshold into the corridor. She was very careful to step on their toes as she passed between them.
Chenaya held her anger in a clenched fist behind her back and regarded the tall, fair-skinned woman who addressed her. Obviously a foreigner like the four guards, she thought, but from what god-cursed land? Painted breasts, indeed! Was that really some kind of webbing between those bare toes? Why, she must be a freak! The woman would be laughed out of any court in Ranke, if only for her garish costume.
Yet, she was also the Beysa, whatever that was, and the guards had bowed when they had presented Chenaya.
The Beysa moved about a room that had to be part of her private apartments. With a short clap of her hands, she dismissed guards and servants all. Only the two of them remained facing each other.
"What did you want with Kadakithis?" the Beysa probed, moving to a chair in the center of the room. Chenaya suspected it had been placed there for just this audience. The foreign woman sprawled there, making a show of appearing at ease.
Chenaya answered slowly, containing herself. There was much to learn here, a secret she had not known when she had come to this city. Now she began to suspect why no word had co
me to Ranke from Sanctuary in some months.
"The world is a vain collection of private pursuits," she responded vaguely. "By what right do you issue commands in a Rankan governor's palace, or in violation of Rankan law, dare to maintain a personal guard within these walls?"
The Beysa's gaze hardened, fixed on her with a subtle ^ menace. Chenaya lifted her chin and hurled the same cold glare back at the foreign bitch.
"I am not accustomed to rudeness. I could have your tongue ripped out by the root." The Beysa straightened in her chair; the carefully manicured nails of one hand began to tap idly on the chair's carven arm.
Chenaya arched a brow. "You could try," she answered evenly. "But I rather suspect I'd be holding both those marbles you call eyes in the palm of my hand before your guards could answer your summons."
The Beysa stared, but Chenaya could read nothing in those strange eyes. Only a slight twitch of the mouth and those tapping nails betrayed the woman's irritation.
The Beysa spoke again after a long, uncomfortable silence. Her tone was more conciliatory this time. "Perhaps you are not so accustomed to rudeness, either. The regular gate guard who admitted you to the grounds claimed you bore the Imperial Rankan Seal. How is it you have such a thing in your possession?"
Chenaya felt the sigil she wore on her right hand and twisted it. Each member of the Imperial family owned a similar ring by right. Even a Rankan peasant knew that, but she was disinclined to explain it to this woman. Instead, she glanced around the chamber, finely furnished but less lavish than her own in Ranke, and spied a wine vessel and small chalices on a side table. She crossed to it, purposefully ignoring the Beysa, poured a dollop and sipped, not offering to serve. It was sweet liquor, unlike any she had-tasted; she wondered if the foreigner had brought it from her own land.
"You are a very rude young woman," her hostess said.
"So are you," Chenaya shot back over the rim of her cup, adding the lie, "only you're not so young."
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