“I think there was a compliment in there somewhere—so thanks. But if you’re not doing this to help me find Gaunt, why are you?”
Royce paused. From a bag he drew out Wesley’s hat. He must have fetched it down before they left the ship. “He stuck his neck out for me three times. The last one got him killed. There’s no way this fortress is blowing up.”
Even in the dark, Royce found handholds and spots to place his feet that Hadrian could never have spotted in the full light of day. Like a spider, he scaled the side of the tower, until he came to the base of the first niche. There he set his first anchor and dropped a rope to Hadrian. By the time Hadrian reached the foothold of that niche, Royce was already nailing in the next pin and sending down another coil. They continued this way, finding minute edges where several thousand years of erosion revealed the maker’s seams in the rock. Centuries-old crevices and cracks allowed Royce to climb what had once been slick, smooth stone.
Two hours later, the trees below appeared like tiny bushes, and the cold, wintry winds buffeted them like barn swallows. They were only a third of the way up.
“It’s time,” Royce shouted over the howl of the wind. He anchored a pin, tied a rope to it, and climbed back down.
Hadrian groaned. “I hate this part!”
“Sorry, buddy, nothing I can do about it. The niches are all over that way.” Royce gestured across to where the vertical grooves cut into the rock on the far side of a deep crevasse.
Royce tied the rope to his harness and linked himself to Hadrian.
“Now, just watch me,” Royce told him, and taking hold of the rope, he sprinted across the stone face. Reaching the edge of the crevasse, he leapt, swinging out like a clock’s pendulum. He cleared the gap by what looked like only a few inches. On the far side, he clung to the stone, dangling like a bug on a twig. He slowly pulled himself up and drove another pin. Then, after tying off the rope, he waved to Hadrian.
If Hadrian missed the jump, he would slip into the crevasse, where he would end up dangling helplessly, assuming the rope held him. The force of the fall could easily pop out the holding pin or even snap the rope. He took a deep breath of cold air, steadied himself, and began to run. On the far side, Royce leaned out for him. He reached the edge and jumped. The wind whistled past his face, blurring his vision as tears streaked across his cheeks. He struck the far side just short of the landing, bashing his head hard enough to see stars. He tasted blood and wondered if he had lost his front teeth even as his fingertips lost their tenuous hold and he began to fall. Royce tried to grab him, but was too late. Hadrian fell.
He dropped about three inches.
Hadrian dangled from the rope Royce had anchored the moment his partner landed. Hadrian groaned in pain while wiping blood from his face.
“See?” Royce shouted in his ear. “That went much better than last time!”
They continued scaling upward, working within the relative shelter of the vertical three-sided chimneys. They were too high now for Hadrian to see anything except the tiny lights of the port city. Everything else below was darkness. They rested for a time in the semi-sheltered niche and then climbed upward again.
Higher and higher, Royce led the way. Hadrian’s hands were sore from gripping the rope and burned from the few times he had slipped. His legs, exhausted and weak, quivered dangerously. The wind was brutal. Gusting in an eddy caused by the chimney they followed, it pushed outward like an invisible hand trying to knock them off. The sun came up and Hadrian was nearing the end of his endurance when they finally reached the bridge. They were slightly more than two-thirds of the way, but thankfully they did not need to reach the top.
What appeared from the ground to be a thin bridge was actually forty feet thick. They scrambled over the edge, hauled up their ropes, ducked into a sheltered archway, and sat in the shadows, catching their breath.
“I’d like to see Derning scale that,” Royce said, looking down.
“I don’t think anyone but you could manage it,” Hadrian replied. “Nor is there anyone crazy enough to try.”
Dozens of men guarded the great gates at the base of the tower, but no one was on the bridge. It was thought to be impossible for intruders to enter from the top, and the cold wind kept the workers inside. Royce gave the tall slender stone doors a push.
“Locked?” Hadrian asked.
Royce nodded. “Let’s hope they haven’t changed the combination.”
Hadrian chuckled. “Took you eighteen hours last time, right after you told me, ‘This will only take a minute.’”
“Remind me again why I brought you?” Royce asked, fanning his hands out across the embossed face of the doors. “Ah, here it is.”
Royce placed his fingers carefully and pushed. A hundred tons of solid stone glided inward as if on a cushion of air, rotating open without a sound. Inside, an enormous cathedral ceiling vaulted hundreds of feet above them. Shafts of morning sunshine entered through distant skylights built into the dome overhead, revealing a complex world of bridges, balconies, archways, and a labyrinth of gears. Some gears lay flat, while others stood upright. Some were as small as a copper coin, and then there were those that were several stories tall and thicker than a house. A few rotated constantly, driven by steam created from the volcanically superheated seawater. The majority of the gears, particularly the big ones, remained motionless, waiting. Aside from the mechanisms, nothing else moved. The only sounds were the regular ratcheting rhythm and the whirl of the great machine.
Royce scanned the interior. “Nobody home,” he said at length.
“Wasn’t last time either. I’m surprised they haven’t tightened security up more.”
“Oh yeah, a single break-in after centuries is something to schedule your guards around.”
“They’ll be kicking themselves tomorrow.”
They found the stairs—short, shallow steps built for little feet. Royce and Hadrian took them two and three at a time. Ducking under low archways, Hadrian nearly had to crawl through the entrance to the Big Room. This was the name Hadrian had given it the last time they had visited. The room itself was huge, but the name came from the master gear. It stood on edge and what they could see was as high as a castle tower, but most of its bulk sunk beneath the floor and through a wall, leaving only a quarter of the gear visible. Its edge was ringed with thick teeth like a castle battlement, only larger—much larger. It meshed with two other gears, which connected to a dozen more that joined the dwarven puzzle.
“The lock was at the top, right?” Royce asked.
“Think so—yeah, Gravis was up there when we found him.”
“Okay, I’ll handle this. Keep an eye out.”
Royce leapt up to one of the smaller gears and walked up the teeth like they were a staircase. He jumped from one to the next until he reached the master gear. Harder to climb since the teeth were huge, but for Royce it was no problem. He was soon out of sight, and a few minutes later a loud stone-upon-stone sound echoed as a giant post of rock descended from the ceiling, settling in the valley between two teeth, locking the great gear.
When Royce returned, he was grinning happily.
“I’d love to see the look on Merrick’s face when this place doesn’t blow. Even if the Ghazel take the city, he’ll be scratching his head for months. There’s no way he can know about this master switch. Gravis only knew because it was his ancestor that designed the place.”
“And we only know because we caught him in the act.” Hadrian thought a moment. “Do you think Merrick might be nearby, waiting for the fireworks?”
Royce sighed. “Of course not. If it were me, I wouldn’t be within a hundred miles of this explosion. I don’t even want to be here now. Don’t worry, I know him. The fact that this mountain doesn’t explode will drive him nuts. All we have to do is drop the right hints to the wrong people and we won’t have to look for him—he’ll find us. Now come on. Let’s see if we can find what’s blocking the vents so we can put this back in place a
nd cook some goblins.”
CHAPTER 22
GOING HOME
Archibald Ballentyne stared out the window of the great hall. It looked cold. Brown grass, blowing dead leaves, clouds that looked heavy and full of snow, and geese that flew away before a veil of gray all reminded him the seasons had changed. Wintertide was less than two months away. He kicked the stone of the wall with his boot. It made a muffled thud and sent a pain up his leg, making him wince.
Why do I have to think of that? Why do I always have to think of that?
Behind him, Saldur, Ethelred, and Biddings debated something, but he was not listening. He did not care anymore. Maybe he should leave. Maybe he should take a small retinue and just go home to Chadwick and the sanctity of his Gray Tower. The palace would be a wreck by now, and he could busy himself with repairing the damage the servants had caused in his absence. Bruce had likely been dipping into his brandy store and the tax collectors would be behind in their duties. It would feel nice to be home for the holiday. He could invite a few friends and his sister over for—He stopped and considered kicking the wall again, but it had hurt enough last time.
Sleeping in a tent this time of year would be miserable. Besides, what would the regents say? Moreover, what would they do in his absence? They treated him badly enough when he was here. How much worse would they conspire against him if he left?
He did not really want to be home. Ballentyne Castle could be a lonely place, all the more horrid in winter. He used to dream of how all that would change when he married, when he had a beautiful wife and children. He used to fantasize about Alenda Lanaklin. She was a pretty thing. He also often imagined taking the hand of King Armand’s daughter, Princess Beatrice. She was certainly appealing. He had even spent many a summer evening watching the milkmaids in the field and contemplating the possibility of snatching one from her lowly existence to be the new Lady Ballentyne. How grateful she would be, how dutiful, how easily controlled. That had been before he had come to Aquesta—before he had met her.
Even sleep gave him no solace, as he dreamed about Modina now. He danced with her on their own wedding day. He despised waking up. Archibald did not even care about the title anymore. He would give up the idea of being emperor if he could have her. He even considered that he would give up being earl—but she was marrying Ethelred!
He refused to look at the regent. The fool cared nothing for her. How could he be so cold as to force a girl to marry him just for the political benefit? The man was a blackguard.
“Archie … Archie!” Ethelred was calling him.
He cringed at the mention of the name he hated and turned from the window with a scowl.
“Archie, you need to talk to your man Breckton.”
“What’s wrong with him now?”
“He’s refusing to take my orders. He insists he serves only you. You need to set him straight on the lay of things. We can’t have knights whose allegiance is strictly to their lords. They have to recognize the supremacy of the New Empire and the chain of command.”
“Seems to me that’s what he’s doing, observing the chain of command.”
“Yes, yes, but it’s more than that. He’s becoming obstinate. I’m going to be the emperor in a couple of months and I can’t have my best general requiring that I get your permission to give him an order.”
“I’ll speak with him,” Archibald said miserably, mostly just so he could stop listening to Ethelred’s voice. If the old bastard were not such an accomplished soldier, he would seriously consider challenging him, but Ethelred had fought in dozens of battles, while Archibald had engaged only in practice duels with blunt-tipped swords. Even if he wanted to commit suicide, he certainly would not give Ethelred the satisfaction.
“What about Modina?” Ethelred asked.
The mention of her name brought Archibald’s attention back to the conversation.
“Will she be ready?”
“Yes, I think so,” Saldur replied. “Amilia has been doing wonders with her.”
“Amilia?” Ethelred tapped his forehead. “Isn’t she the maid you promoted to Chief Imperial Secretary?”
“Yes,” Saldur said, “and I’ve been thinking that after the wedding, I want to keep her on.”
“We’ll have no use for her after the wedding.”
“I know, but I think I could use her elsewhere. She’s proven herself to be both intelligent and resourceful.”
“Do whatever you like with her. I certainly don’t—”
“Queens always have need of secretaries, even when they have husbands,” Archibald interrupted. “I understand you’re going to assume total control of the New Empire, but she’ll still need an assistant.”
Ethelred looked at Saldur with a puzzled expression. “He doesn’t know?”
“Know what?” Archibald asked.
Saldur shook his head. “I felt the fewer that knew, the better.”
“After the wedding,” Ethelred told Archibald, “once I’m crowned emperor, I’m afraid Modina will have an unfortunate accident—a fatal accident.”
“It’s all arranged,” Nimbus reported. Arista paced the room and Modina sat alone on the bed. “I got the uniform to him, and tonight the farmer will smuggle Hilfred into the gate just before sunset in the hay cart.”
“Will they check that?” Arista asked, pausing in her journey across the room.
“Not anymore, not since they called off the witch hunt. Things are business as usual again. They know the farmer. He’s in and out every third day of the week.”
Arista nodded and resumed her pacing.
“The same wagon will cart you all out at dawn. You’ll go out through the city gates. There will be three horses waiting at the crossroads for you with food, water, blankets, and extra clothing.”
“Thank you, Nimbus.” Arista hugged the beanpole of a man, bringing a blush to his cheeks.
“Are you sure this will work?” Modina asked.
“I don’t see why not,” Arista said. “I’ll do just what I did last time. I’ll become Saldur, and Hilfred will be a fourth-floor guard. You’re sure you took the right uniform?”
Nimbus nodded.
“I’ll order the guard to open the entrance to the prison. We’ll grab Gaunt and leave. I’ll instruct the seret to remain on duty and tell no one. Believing I’m Saldur, no one will know he’s gone for hours, maybe even days.”
“I still don’t understand.” Modina looked puzzled. “Amilia said there was a prison in the tower, but all the cells were empty.”
“There is a secret door in the floor. A very cleverly hidden door, sealed with a gemlock.”
“What’s a gemlock?”
“A precious stone cut to produce a specific vibration that when held near the door trips the lock open. I used a magical variation on my tower door back home, and the church used a far more sophisticated version to seal the main entrance to Gutaria Prison. They’re using the same thing here, and the key is the emerald in the pommel of the sword the Seret Knight wears.”
“So, you’ll make your escape tonight?” the empress asked.
Arista nodded. The empress looked down, a sadness creeping into her eyes. “What’s wrong?” Arista asked.
“Nothing. I’m just going to miss you.”
Arista’s stomach twisted as she looked out the window and watched the sun set.
Am I being foolish?
Her plan had always been to merely locate Gaunt, not break him out. Now that she knew exactly where he was, she could return home and have Alric send Royce and Hadrian to rescue him. Only that had been before—before she had found Hilfred, before she had been reunited with Thrace, and before she had known she could impersonate Saldur. It seemed like such an easy thing to do that leaving without Gaunt would be an unnecessary risk. The smoke verified that he still lived, but could she be sure that would be the case several weeks from then?
She was alone with Modina. They had not said a word to each other for hours. Something was troublin
g the empress—something more than usual. Modina was stubborn, and no force could move her once she decided on a course. Apparently the course she had decided on was not to talk.
The gate opened and the hay cart entered.
Arista watched intently. Nothing seemed amiss—no guards, no shouting, just a thick pile of hay and a slow-walking donkey pulling it. The farmer, an elderly man, parked the cart by the stables, unhitched his donkey, hitched it to a new cart, and led the animal out again. Staring at the cart, she could not help herself. The plan had been to wait until just before dawn, but she could not leave Hilfred lying there. She managed to restrain herself only until she saw the harvest moon begin to rise, and then she stood.
“It’s time,” she said.
Modina lifted her head.
Arista walked to the middle of the room and knelt.
“Arista, I …” Modina began hesitantly.
“What is it?”
“Nothing …Good luck.”
Arista got up and crossed the room to hug her tightly. “Good luck to you too.”
The empress shook her head. “You keep all of it—I’m not going to be needing any.”
Disguised as Regent Saldur, Arista traveled down the stairs, wondering what Modina had almost said. The excitement of the night, however, kept her thoughts jumping from one thing to the next. She discovered that she could remain in her disguise for a long time. It broke when she slept, but it would last beyond what she would need that night. This gave her greater confidence. Although she was still concerned about bumping into the real Saldur, the thought of seeing Hilfred again was overwhelming.
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