“He fell, then. Scraped himself fairly well too—the cloth’s saturated. Think it’ll slow him down?”
Renier shrugged, pulling his nightcloak tighter about him. Already the oppressive heat of the day was waning; the chill of night hung in the shadows. “Maybe, if he cut his leg or side. In any case, he’ll probably be more careful now—that in itself’ll hold him back.”
They scrambled up the slope, sure now of their path and alert for small signs of the man’s passage. Twilight shaded the sky. A few minutes later, the orb of the sun entirely gone, Renier pulled from his pouch a pair of light-enhancers. A sallow moon hoisted itself in the east. The rocks hid deep shadows, but the landscape was bright enough for them to continue at the same pace. They were gaining quickly on de Sezimbra.
“Renier . . .”
The assassin turned, his eyes goggled with the enhancers. “Yah?”
“The detector went off a few minutes ago. I thought he was just on the edge of the range and it’d come back on, but it hasn’t. We’re near him.”
Their vibros hissed from sheaths, thrumming as if glad to be released from confinement.
The Hoorka followed the man’s trail: a scuffling of dirt, displaced rocks, the marks of boot heels. The going was rough, always west and upward. A cliff scarred with vertical slashes like the wounds of a giant claw walled them to the right. On their left, the path fell off steeply into a deep ravine—they could hear the sound of running water in the darkness. The ledge narrowed as they went higher and they were forced to move single file for a time, until the gouged cliff shattered itself into a small plateau littered with large boulders. Hiding places abounded. Sartas muttered a curse.
“We’ll have to search here, damn him. Looks as if the cliff begins again just ahead. You start there—see if you can tell whether he’s gone on. If not, start working back toward me. If we’ve got him trapped here, we can go home.”
Renier nodded, already moving. Sartas began a slow examination of the area, vibro always at ready, feeling a tension in the muscles of his back. He’d felt the thrill of that tension before—it had always betokened the presence of the victim.
Sartas heard the commotion first: a muffled cry of “Hoorka!” followed by a fleshy thud and the dopplering whine of a vibro moving through air. Sartas ran toward the sounds, dodging between boulders, and suddenly getting a clear view.
Near the edge of the ravine, Renier was grappling with de Sezimbra. Somehow, the assassin had been stripped of his vibro; it buzzed on the ground nearby. De Sezimbra seemed to know the art of hand-to-hand combat. As Sartas watched (still running, wondering whether a thrown vibro would be accurate enough and rejecting the idea) de Sezimbra twisted out of Renier’s grasp, kicking with a surprisingly agile movement. With a wailing cry of frustration, Renier stumbled and fell, slipping over the ravine’s edge. His fingers scrabbled for a hold as de Sezimbra turned to see Sartas, still meters away, striding toward him. Sartas cursed inwardly: by the time Renier could scramble up again, de Sezimbra would be gone. Again he fought the impulse to throw his weapon—too far, and a twirling vibro was as likely to hit with hilt as well as edge. De Sezimbra scooped up Renier’s weapon and ran.
The victim was gone; Renier had yet to reappear. The code was explicit on the point: if kin might be in danger, the victim was to be ignored until the kin’s status was determined. Sartas peered over the edge of the depression, thumbing the enhancers to full power. He thought he could make out the figure of a man, but it could well be a trick of shadows. “Renier,” he called softly, then more loudly.
The only reply was a faint echo. “By the frigging Hag—” Sartas glanced about—no, de Sezimbra was too far away by now. He could always find the trail again. He decided Renier must be unconscious, must have struck his head on a rock. The code and his own emotions tallied; he made his way carefully down the steep incline, grasping at rocks, slipping, sliding. He cursed de Sezimbra, cursed the Dame, cursed Renier.
It had to have been a freak, a whim of the Dame. When Sartas saw Renier, he halted his descent suddenly, grabbing for a handhold as rocks slid from under his feet. There was no mistaking the angle at which Renier’s head rested against his shoulder or the stiff arms that seemed to hug the earth. Sartas had seen death enough, had heard the Hag’s cackling at close quarters. He knew, knew from the stillness, from the feel of it.
Renier was dead.
He came down more slowly now. No reason to hurry. Renier might have been asleep from the appearance of the body. Sartas, his hands gentle, turned Renier on his side, rocks cascading below them. The left temple was a jellied depression, the skull crushed with blood trickling sluggishly over the open wound. With no hope, Sartas felt for a pulse and found none. He hunkered down beside the body, bracing himself. Sighing, he invoked She of the Five, performing a quick rite for the dead kin. His words were quick, his gaze restless and always avoiding the body.
He fumbled in the pocket of his uniform, pulling out a small beacon. He touched one face of the device and set it beside Renier. Then he thumbed on his relay.
“McWilms?” He waited a moment, then spoke more harshly. “Damn you, boy, you’d better answer.”
“Here, sirrah.” The words were tinny and distant, surprised and questioning. “You got de Sezimbra?”
“No,” Sartas spat. “Renier is dead. I’ve set the beacon for you to follow. Trace it and take care of the body—I did the short rites, but I want you to give him the longer code-rite. Get the car as near as you can—we’ll need it.” He spoke flatly, almost tonelessly; it was not a voice to interrupt. “Do you understand all that?”
“Yah, sirrah.” A pause and a crackling of electronic thunder. “What of de Sezimbra?”
“If he was important to you, I’d have said so, ass.” Sartas let go the transmission button and breathed deeply, in and out. Then: “I’m after the man now. Hurry yourself. I don’t know what carrion eaters live here, but if that body is touched, I’ll take it out of your hide. Understood?”
“I’ve already left.”
Sartas crouched, feeling the loose stones moving underfoot. His legs ached with the night’s run. “Hag-kin,” he muttered to himself, glancing down at the corpse. “He was luckier than we thought, neh? A worthy opponent. He’ll be a fit companion for you, Renier, one to be proud of. I admire him. He’s got fire and determination.” The assassin reached down to touch the broken face. “You were a fine kin. All Hoorka will miss you.”
He straightened, leaning against the slope. He glanced up at the jagged, moon-glazed summit of the ravine.
He began climbing.
• • •
21:45. It had been easy to find de Sezimbra’s trail. The detector had shown him an image for only a quarter of an hour and had then gone quiet. The fight with Renier—the brush with the Hag’s talons—had evidently frightened the man. He left the spoor of panic and fear, no attempt at stealth. Upward, westward, climbing toward the cold, hard sky, pushed by the adrenaline of death-fright . . .
But Sartas knew that his energy would only be a temporary ally. He’d seen it in other contracts. De Sezimbra had had the longer run, and the Hoorka were conditioned for the punishment. Time was still on Sartas’s side, if he could get closer.
He found himself filled with a grudging admiration for de Sezimbra. He’d expected the man to be easy prey, but he’d seriously underestimated his resources. That might have cost Renier his life. Hoorka had died on contracts before—not many, but it was something that was expected at times. The Hoorka knew victims would strike back, would struggle against death; for some kin, Sartas was aware, that implicit danger was exciting, titillating. Renier had not been one of those, however. Sartas wished him peace in the afterlife. His kin’s death drove him, made him ache for revenge, but the anger was tempered with respect for de Sezimbra. He felt curiously remote from the sadness, holding it back from his consciousness for the time being. Later, he’d mourn and weep with the rest of his kin, would feel emptied as Renier’s
body went back to ash in the soot-smeared Cavern of the Dead.
In de Sezimbra’s place, Sartas would have done the same. He approved of de Sezimbra for that, but he could kill that which he admired. He forced himself to concentrate on his task; all the rest could wait.
He’d seen that de Sezimbra was tiring: the marks were now fresh on the dirt and stone, and the sparse vegetation that the man trampled had yet to spring back up. Close. Sartas pressed himself, moved a bit faster. Soon.
It was not a prepossessing scene: Sartas slipped into a narrow cleft in the cliff wall, following the tracks. The crevice opened out suddenly into a natural amphitheater, a hollow perhaps thirty meters across surrounded by dour gray walls of stone. There was little cover but the moon-shadow. The light-enhancer pierced the murk easily enough. Sartas could see de Sezimbra crouched opposite the entrance, his clothing torn, his side bloody with scratches, his dark skin shiny with perspiration. Panting, he still held Renier’s vibro in his hand, but it was not activated. He’d trapped himself.
Sartas, his nightcloak swirling about him as he halted, stared at de Sezimbra. The man was still, not certain that he’d been seen. “Marco de Sezimbra, your life has been claimed by Hag Death.”
The assassin’s voice, stentorian in the night stillness, startled de Sezimbra. He shook himself, disbelieving, then stood, his breath ragged. “I’m not yet dead, sirrah. And for whom other than this Hag Death do you want me?”
“That information’s not for you.” Curtly, but not unwillingly, Sartas answered. The man could go nowhere, there was still enough time. If he wanted to talk, let him.
“Ahh.” De Sezimbra nodded. “It doesn’t matter, really. I know it’s Guillene and Moache. He’s the only one that would think that he has enough reason. You’ll really let me go at 23:10?”
“I would have.” The emphasis was pronounced.
The ghost of a smile played at the corners of de Sezimbra’s mouth. “You still might need to. You won’t throw your vibro—that’s a low probability attack. You have to come and get me, and I could conceivably get past you.”
“Or you could use the vibro.”
This time he did smile. “I’m afraid it’s not my forte. I’d rather be sneaky.”
“You won’t get past. Try and you’ll feel my blade. I’ve more pleasant means of death, if you’re willing to concede the inevitable. You won’t get past.” Sartas spoke with confidence, but he remembered Renier; he could not afford to underestimate the man again.
De Sezimbra was almost amiable. He stepped forward into the wash of moonlight, letting his pack drop from his shoulders. He limped slightly, favoring his left leg. “I’ve been on other worlds that didn’t want me, sirrah. I’ve learned how to defend myself to an extent. Had to. I might not be the easy target you suppose. And I never concede inevitabilities. That’s too complacent an attitude. It allows you to let injustices continue. I fight back, instead. Ask your friend—he’s waiting on the other side of the cleft, isn’t he?”
A spasm of pain twisted Sartas’s face, a shadow. “You don’t know? You killed him, de Sezimbra.” A pause. “He waits for you, but it’s not here.”
“No.” Shock and surprise were loud in the denial. “I wasn’t intending that . . . I didn’t hold back, that’s true, but he was going to kill me if I didn’t get away. I thought the fall would give me time . . . I checked with Niffleheim. They said the Hoorka were scrupulous, would follow their code. All I wanted was the time.” His eyes pleaded. A man who’s never killed, Sartas thought, and who hadn’t really contemplated the possibility of having to do so. “I’m sorry,” de Sezimbra said. “I didn’t want that to happen. Believe me.” He seemed genuinely perturbed, concerned.
“A victim that doesn’t resist the Hag deserves his fate. And our apprentice must have told you—we don’t take a person’s fate out of the hands of their gods. I congratulate you on your skill,” he remarked stonily. “Dame Fate was with you. It wasn’t your time yet. It is now.”
“Dame Fate may still be with me.”
“If She is, you’ll know soon enough.”
Sartas said no more. He moved slowly into the open, watching de Sezimbra, waiting for the man to move, to commit himself. Back, to the left: de Sezimbra retreated, eyes glancing from side to side wildly, looking for an avenue of escape. The Hoorka moved inexorably toward him.
De Sezimbra flicked on his vibro.
It happened quickly. De Sezimbra suddenly leapt straight forward, far more agilely than Sartas expected—the limp was gone, a deception. The man’s vibro thrust at Sartas, but the Hoorka, despite his surprise, was already countering. He turned, evading the blade, and slashed with his own weapon, hearing the whine of the vibro and the tearing of cloth. De Sezimbra groaned with pain as the vibro raked his side, and he kicked at Sartas’s groin. Sartas deflected the blow harmlessly, lunging. This time he found his target. De Sezimbra staggered back wordlessly, dropping his weapon, hands clenched to his stomach. Blood, bright arterial blood, was slick around his fingers. He moaned, looking up at Sartas. He seemed about to speak; his mouth worked, but no words came. He nodded, almost a salutation, and slipped to his knees. Grunting, de Sezimbra tried to rise again and found he could not. He looked up at the sky, at the watching moon.
He fell to his side on the rocks.
“If I could’ve denied the Dame’s whim, I would have, de Sezimbra,” Sartas whispered. “If a man deserved to live . . . I wish you’d been luckier.”
The Hag came to Heritage for a second time that night.
Sheathing his vibro (he would not clean it again until he returned to Neweden and could feed She of the Five), Sartas called McWilms, giving the apprentice his position. While he waited, he gave de Sezimbra the rite of the dead and wrapped the body in the spare nightcloak.
In time, McWilms arrived, and they took the body back to the car. On their way to Home, the tachyon relay on Sartas’s belt suddenly shrilled, startling them both.
At Underasgard, morning light had touched the dawnrock.
• • •
They could not help but attract attention as they entered the boundaries of Home. The throaty rumble of the groundcar shook the sleepy ones from their beds and turned the heads of those on the streets. All stared at the death-apparitions: the dust-lathered Hoorka in the open car, dark in the fluttering nightcloaks; the silent bundles in the back, wrapped in black and gray cloth.
They knew, the inhabitants of Home. The Hoorka could sense the news spreading through the city, welling outward.
Guillene’s home was set well back from the street that wandered through Park Hill. It was further held aloof by a high wall and a wrought-steel gate flanked by two guards. The Hoorka rode toward it through a scurrying of people. Already a crowd had formed before the gates, standing silent across the lane, moving with a quiet restlessness. The guards, dour-faced, perhaps a little frightened, uneasily watched the mob grow, crowd-prods in hand. One whispered into a relay button on his lapel as the Hoorka rode up, shattering the night stillness.
The groundcar shuddered to a halt, the roar of the engine died. Sartas and McWilms, the cowls up on their nightcloaks, dismounted and picked up the bundle behind Sartas, handling it with a curious gentleness. They laid it before the gate as Guillene’s men watched, as the mute faces across the street stared. The crowd swayed, murmured. “Is Sirrah Guillene here?” Sartas asked.
The guard to whom he spoke didn’t have a chance to reply. From the darkness beyond the gate, a figure moved into sight The muttering of the crowd increased. “I’m Phillipe Guillene, Hoorka.” He was tall and slight, his hair a crescent of silver around the dome of his head, and the robe he wore spoke of silken wealth. The voice was smooth, aristocratic. Gray eyes glanced down at the wrapped body outside the gate. “Is that de Sezimbra?”
“It is. Your contract has been fulfilled. Do you need to see the face?”
He glanced up. Sartas could see quick horror in the man’s eyes. So that’s why he would pay Hoorka, then.
He doesn’t want to be near death. “No,” Guillene said, his voice rushed. “I believe you.”
There was a concerted whispering in the ranks of people across the way. Guillene looked, seemed to see the spectators for the first time. He looked at them rather than Sartas. “De Sezimbra was to be an example to them,” he said. “The man was a troublemaker and a fool.”
“I found him to be a brave and honorable opponent.” Beneath the shadowed hood, Sartas’s eyes glittered. He defied Guillene to gainsay him.
Guillene’s face flushed with irritation, visible even in the dim light of the gate-lamps and the moon. He tugged at the belt of his robe, drawing it tighter around his waist. “You needn’t speak your opinions here, Hoorka. I paid you—and well—for your work. It’s now done. You may return to Neweden. I want nothing more to do with you.”
“And the body?”
“My people will throw it on the slagheaps with the rest of the filth.”
Sartas said nothing, but his stance altered subtly. Behind him, McWilms sensed the shift in attitude; he moved back and to one side, in a better position to support Sartas if trouble developed. The crowd-murmurs grew louder, though none of them made a move to cross the street, and none spoke loudly enough for Guillene to understand words. If they were angry with Guillene’s treatment of de Sezimbra, they were also cowed.
“De Sezimbra deserves better rites.” Sartas spoke slowly, loudly. “As I said, I found him to be courageous and honorable.”
Like steel striking steel, his words drew sparks from Guillene. The man reared back as if struck. His eyebrows lowered, his lips parted, and the noble face was suddenly ugly. “I decide what is to happen on Heritage, Hoorka. If I say that the body is to be given to the slagheap, then that will be done.” He gestured curtly to his guards. “Take it,” he said.
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