He didn’t seem to even notice it. Even if I worked here and this was my daily routine, I’d notice. Maybe his sense of smell had been removed. Mercifully, we were walking through a small side-door before I lost my stomach contents on the noxious foliage that surrounded us.
The interior was almost a relief after that. It was dark in here, the only light cast through an open doorway at the end of a short hall. Tommy headed for the light. I followed slowly, looking into the dark. There were other doorways here, three, I thought, but with no light it was very difficult to see what might be through them. Halls, rooms, there was no way to tell. Tommy stopped in the lit doorway, his body dark against the warm yellow of the light.
He cleared his throat. “Brung in some trespassers.” He ducked his head, like he was embarrassed. “Couple ‘o guys.”
“You brought them here?” The voice from the inner room was gravelly. I heard a scrape, and an odd thump. “Why the hells did you…”
He pushed Tommy out of the way and peered into the darkness, then recoiled. “Thass a troll!”
“Well, yuh, he was with ‘em.”
“They had a troll and they surrendered?”
Now that I could see Tommy’s boss, I was busy making assumptions. “Not exactly. Tommy invited himself into our camp, and asked nicely.”
I stepped forward into the light, and was gratified when the sodden mass of what had once been a fairy recoiled. He was hugely fat, missing one leg well above the knee, and between the nose and the eyes in matching reds with broken blood vessels, I knew about the drinking before I could smell it. Behind him, the room was empty. The filthy floor was the backdrop for a battered wood table and a single chair in front of it. Behind it, an overstuffed leather chair with splitting seams was obviously his.
I heard nothing else, other than his labored breathing. We were alone. I stepped forward again, into his face. “You recognize me?” I kept my voice low, knowing I had his full attention. “You know who I am, at least.”
He nodded, his eyes riveted on mine. He had light brown eyes, currently slightly dilated in his fear. He licked his lips and moved them like he was trying to talk.
“Yes?” I prompted when he made no noise.
“Y-you… why are you here?” He managed. “Why aren’t you out there?”
He was pointing in the general direction of High Court and the coming battleground. I shrugged. “Felt like paying her an informal visit.”
He gobbled slightly. His words seemed to either flood out or get stuck like a cork in a bottle. I took a slow step forward, and he broke, backing rapidly into the room. I followed him in. Behind me, I heard a suspiciously wet crunch. I had to think that was one of the goblins. Probably Lug, as Raven had likely taken care of the other in complete silence. Tommy had vanished. I knew he hadn’t gotten far. I could trust Raven.
Tommy’s Boss, though.
“So, you have a name?” I asked casually. I waved at the leather chair. “Why don’t you sit and take a load off?”
He looked frantically around. There were no windows in this room. No art hung on the walls. A tapestry on the end wall, the one I was facing as I came through the door, was the only thing that broke up the dingy white walls. It was a dingy as the walls, the scene it had once portrayed long gone into the dull smoke and gray and yellow of long abuse.
“Now what are you thinking?” I asked him casually, swinging the straight-back wooden chair around and straddling it casually. I could feel the weight of the pistol on my hip. Tommy hadn’t even looked twice at it, and I’d been wearing it when I slept the evening before, the holster. The gun had been tucked under my pillow, and I’d holstered it when Lug picked me up and Tommy wasn’t looking. It had been easy enough to do. The fairy, like most, had likely never seen a gun, or knew what it could do.
I was still waiting. The big Boss had collapsed into the other chair, and was looking fixedly at the doorway. I followed his gaze.
“They aren’t coming.” I told him without turning my head back toward him. I could see him well enough to know that he wasn’t making any sudden moves. I wasn’t using magic, didn’t need to use any. This was old hat, soft, comfortable, and lethal.
“In fact, no one is coming. So you have some time to answer a few questions.”
He shook his head. I nodded. “You’re going to tell me how many men are in the castle right now.”
He shot a glance at the doorway, still dark and empty. We both sat in silence for a moment. There was nothing out there. He swallowed hard.
“Maybe fifty men at arms.” He suggested.
“Try again.” I leaned forward, crossing my arms on the back of the chair. “Try again, or I will call my troll friend in here. You can talk without either leg.”
He collapsed, burying his face in his hands. “Buh… buh… ‘Bout ten of us, I think.”
That took a minute between sobs. I stood up. He looked up at me, his face a ruin of tears, snot, and scars. “Are… are you going to kill me?”
“Where are the Queen’s Quarters?” I asked, keeping my voice even. His eyes got wide and his lips quivered.
“Sh-she’s no-not here.”
I waited. He sobbed once, an ugly sound. “She has the south tower. The servants are on the first floor, her rooms are above that. No one goes up there. No one.”
I looked down at him and shook my head silently before walking out the door. Behind me, I could hear him hiccupping.
Queen’s Lair
In the dark hall I paused for a moment to let my eyes adjust, and then saw Raven waiting for me.
“All clear?” I asked him.
He nodded. “There were the three we came in with, and two more. Want me…?” He jerked a thumb toward the room I’d just left. I shook my head.
“Waste of effort. We are looking for the South Tower now. Lug?”
He loomed out of the darkness. “I left my bow in the Forest.” His voice sounded the way I’d named him. “This game is good, though.”
That explained where the bow had gone, I’d been wondering, but there had not been a chance to talk until now.
“The plan is in place. Find the Crown, get it to Bella. If we find the Wendigo…”
“He’s mine.” Raven interrupted me. I could hear the anger in his voice, his face too shadowed to read. This was an unusual amount of emotion from the old bird.
“Got that. Not sure what I could do about him, to be honest.”
The Wendigo on the battlefield was a shiversome idea. We’d lose men to it, and then to one another as his infection spread. I headed in the general direction of the center of the tower, looking carefully as I went. It was all dark. The only light was far behind us now, in the room with the broken fairy.
I’ve never been a nice man, no matter what my wife thinks. When we found the next light, it was the kitchen, and the little drab sleeping with her head on the table received a rude awakening.
Lug picked her up by the back of her dress at my gestured command. Her eyes wide, she squeaked once on an indrawn breath, and then her bladder let go.
“Ohpleasedonthurtme.” She ran all the words together into one long wail.
“Take us to the South Tower, to the Queen’s lair.”
I gestured, and Lug set her down. She collapsed into a heap on the floor next to her puddle.
“Get up. I’m not going to kill you, and I don’t have a lot of time. Who else is here?”
She pushed herself up, shaking. I was beginning to wonder about the reactions I was getting here in the castle. Normally it took a little more effort to get results like these.
“Just Cook, and she’s sleeping.” The drab, of a species I couldn’t determine beyond humanoid, hugged herself.
“Get on, then, take us to the Tower.” I prompted. She scuttled for the door.
We followed her. She led us through more dark, disorienting halls, and finally stopped at the foot of some stairs. She pointed up the ornate, sweeping staircase. I peered around into the gloom. It wa
s as ornately decorated as a rococo brothel. This was Dionaea’s style, all right.
“I – I can’t go – go any more,” she panted.
I pointed back toward the kitchen. “Are you going to warn anyone? Clean up your mess, and no-one needs to ever know you even saw us.”
Her eyes huge in the dark, she nodded rapidly.
“Go.” I said.
She scuttled away down the hall, tripping and nearly falling in her haste. I looked at Raven.
“Soft, boy.”
“Not really. There will come a time when we will rebuild Margot’s contacts, and now I have one in the belly of the beast.”
We started up the stairs in silence, Lug taking the rear as always. I stopped at the top of the staircase, facing three doors and another staircase, this one a tight spiral. I held up a hand in a sign for them to stop, and listened. There was nothing. The dead silence was unnerving. This place ought to have at least something stirring, but there wasn’t even a mouse.
“It will be up there.” I pointed to the stairs. “Lug…”
“I stay here. Watch your back.” He knew as well as I did that stair would never hold him.
“Good man.”
I started up the stairs. There was a faintly silvery light at the top of them, but it seemed to take forever to get there. I hadn’t thought to count steps when we started, and I wasn’t going to bother with retreating just to estimate the distance. I knew from the exterior that there were some very tall spires. Added to that, the main staircase to her quarters had been a double-height, starting us at the equivalent of three stories. I stopped thinking about it and looked out the narrow window we had just reached.
The town was visible in the bright moonlight, and the river was a broad stretch of silver, broken only by a bridge. No boats were visible. I didn’t have the angle to see much of the castle itself from here. We were pretty high up, though.
Raven nudged me. “Can you open that thing?”
“I don’t think so. Hang on a minute.” With magic, breaking the window silently would be effortless. I was not using magic, though. From the nospace I pulled a small bag, which contained a nice set of burglar’s tools. There had been more than one occasion I’d used them, and practice meant that with a suction cup and a cutter, I quickly had the pane of glass out of the window. I held it while watching Raven close his eye. He’d been wearing the eyepatch long enough I’d almost forgotten why, but now, as he opened the visible eye and gave me a wolfish grin, I remembered.
The lesser raven landing on the windowsill didn’t come as much of a surprise, then. Raven held out his arm, and the small bird hopped on. They slipped past me, and I laid the glass carefully on the steps. I’d have to remember it on the way back, but at least no one was going to sneak up behind us. Even if they made it past Lug, which I doubted. But no sense wasting a chance to prepare.
Raven seemed to be talking to his bird minion. I had fallen far enough behind I could only hear a low murmur. Then the bird took off and flew up the stairs.
“Looking for trouble?” I asked him, keeping my voice low.
“I keep expecting booby traps.” He paused and I caught up with him. “I would…”
“She obviously feels like she has everyone terrified.” I thought about what we had seen that night.
“To the point of being brittle, and shattering like glass at any pressure?” He shook his head. “The bird is at a door, above. Still, I hear nothing moving.”
“Lead on.”
I was feeling the tension, my shoulders were knotting and my back stiff with anticipation of a knife, even as I knew it wasn’t a rational fear. My legs were feeling the seemingly unending stairs, too. I’d gotten back into shape after my illness, but this was enough to tax anyone but the seemingly indefatigable Raven. Not knowing what was behind that door, but certain that opening it would bring her down on us… I flexed my shoulders and took a deep breath as we reached the tiny landing. Raven waved me toward the door, and I closed my eyes before I reached out to the handle.
There was something there. Not much. The door itself was not magicked. But beyond it, in the space I presumed to be Dionaea’s working room, there was a flicker. Something was alive in there. I opened my eyes and took a deep breath. Then I reached out and pushed the door open.
The bird darted in over my head and surprised me into ducking a little. This saved my life. The crossbow bolt, which was aimed rather too high, sailed over my head and a moment later, we heard it clattering down the steps. But by then, I was facing the very frightened wood elf nose to nose. I’d dropped to one knee when I’d heard the snap of the weapon. She still clutched it, but it was unloaded and she was shaking like a leaf in the wind as I stared into her eyes.
“You shot at me. Shall I kill you?” I kept my voice conversational.
The crossbow dropped to the floor with a clatter, and she whimpered. I got up quickly to avoid the splatter of urine.
“This seems to be a habit people have around here. I would have thought Low Court was more housebroken.”
Raven wrinkled his nose and stepped around the elf. “Brittle and dissolving.”
The elf fell to her knees. She still hadn’t spoken.
“I’m about done with this place.” I walked around her, toward the crown. “Gives me the creeps.”
Raven held up a hand. “It is warded.”
I nodded. I’d expected that, just as I had expected it to be on display as it was, in the center of the room with elfglobes illuminating it. The room glittered, and the crown seemed to emit a soft golden light of its own. Dionaea had indulged herself here, in her lair. Even the floor was gilded wood, with ivory inlay. I hoped it was ivory, at any rate. Bone was just one other possibility.
“I think it’s possible that as soon as I take it, she will appear like a silent fart.”
He chuckled.
“The Wendigo may well be along.”
At this, the elf began to wail, a high pitched ululation that told me, finally, why the whole castle was paralyzed with fear. They’d seen what it could do, and knew their own fates should they not comply.
I bent and took her shoulder, feeling the tiny bones so close to the skin. Her leaves, the token woven into her hair to indicate her time away from her tree, were skeletonized as though they had been under the snow for a winter. “Child. Let us take you home. At the foot of the stairs there is a troll. Go to him, and tell him Lom said to protect you.”
She stared up at me, her eyes so wide I could see the whites entirely. Raven came to the other side of her. “There is a way to break a soul. Simply put, you say… ‘there is a spot you must not stand on. There.’ Then, you punish them if they come too close to it. And they learn to stay away from it. Now, if it the fireplace, a babe learns not to touch, and it is good. But not this person. Now, they change their mind.”
She turned her face a little toward him. He went on softly, his voice almost melodic.
“The breaker then changes the spot the child must not touch. It is not marked, it is invisible, and the child is no longer certain, after a few times, where they can, or cannot, be. So they stand still, afraid to move at all. Because to move is pain. And so they are broken.”
She sobbed, silently. Raven held out a hand to her. “Come, child. You may go down the stairs, may you not?”
She nodded, a tiny motion.
“Go down, and stand with Lug. We will be along shortly.” Raven lifted her to her feet. He led her to the door, and she started down the stairs like an automaton wound up and let go.
“Bad business, this.” I got up and returned to the crown. He came to stand on the other side of the pedestal it rested on.
His face was grim and his voice harsh. “Time to clean out this hell hole. There’s no reason to not use your soap-bubbles any longer, is there?”
“I don’t fancy seeing her here, no. But Lug, and the elf?” I reached out for the crown.
“Pick them up and skip.” He nodded, and I clasped the crown
firmly.
It was like grabbing a live electrical wire. Fairyland has no need of such things, but Above… I’d felt this kind of pain before. I swore out loud, and snapped a bubble around both of us as Raven grabbed my shoulder. I fell to my knees and felt the bubble sway.
I was still on my knees when the bubble popped. We were only downstairs, next to a startled Lug, and an elf who wasn’t paying attention to anything any longer. I didn’t have time to assess her, though.
“Lug, pick her up.” I ordered. The crown felt like it was burning my hands.
Once she was safely cradled in his arms, and I could hear the pounding of feet in the hall, I knew it was time to go. Using the spell had set off alarms, as I had suspected it would. It was time to get out, if we could.
The entire area, not just the castle was strongly warded and wrapped in an interdiction spell. High Court was, as well, and I knew Bella had broken that. So, I would get us as far as I could. The bubble walls trembled around us, and I sent it for the coordinates I’d planned beforehand with Bella.
What happens when you lose integrity of a bubble can range from not much, to catastrophic. It’s not really like flying a balloon across the landscape, and as a matter of fact, I wasn’t entirely sure of the physics of it. But I could feel the spell attenuating as we broke through the interdiction, and I channeled more energy into it. Since Bella had stripped the elfshot poison from me, and freed my ability to do magic, I had reveled in it, but I had not tested myself for any limits. I knew I ought. After a lifetime of being punished for every attempt, I was like that broken child Raven had described.
Now, I was pouring it out, and I felt the snap when I broke the interdiction spell. Not that I broke through it. I broke it. I’d only needed to get out of it, away from the castle, but… I was angry. The condition of the elf I was looking at, the burning sensation of the stolen crown in my hands, the indignities of the Wendigo. I felt the spell go down.
Perhaps others would feel it, and they could run away, now. That, I’d leave for another day. Now, we were rushing toward another confrontation. Bella would be on the verge of a battle, one I hoped to put a stop to before it began.
Dragon Noir (Pixie for Hire Book 3) Page 26
