What lovely eyes, Phin had time to think, just before the Duchess twisted on the stairs and brought her knees to her chest. She drove both feet hard into Phin’s sternum.
Black stone and gray sky spun through Phin’s vision as he toppled backwards with his arms spinning like two windmills. He crashed to the stone sidewalk on his back, landing more or less directly on his spine. The only reason the back of his head didn’t crack the ground was that it overhung the tall curb. Phin gasped for breath as Rickard bolted past him and pounded up the stairs, then the Sarge’s grim visage loomed over him.
“Are you all right?” the Sarge demanded, and Phin nodded though he couldn’t speak.
“Jackass,” the Sarge added before rushing off after Ty and Rickard, who had chased the Duchess into the building through the gaping doorway.
When he could breath Phin rolled to knees and elbows and tottered to his feet. Legionnaire profanity boomed out of the doorway and a breastplate banged as someone ran into a wall. More swearing. Phin’s back throbbed and his chest hurt in two roughly boot-shaped areas, but he mounted the stairs and hurried into the building before the escapee could get herself killed.
Three halls left the entryway but all the noise was coming from dead ahead. Phin moved that way and in the light from the open door he saw the Duchess bolt by through his own shadow, with Ty right behind her. They ran out of Phin’s sight and there was another crash, the sound of splintering wood, screaming and clattering.
Phin entered a long room with a free-standing staircase, just in time to see the Duchess disappear into the darkness above. The big armored man Ty had broken through the bottom steps, and Rickard was trying to extricate him from the jagged remains while both continued to swear. The Sarge loped in from another room and yelled at them to shut up.
“Find another way up,” he said to Phin, then shouted up the broken stairs.
“Miss, what you are doing is a bad idea. This place is not safe! I guarantee that anything you run into in here will be far worse than us.”
Phin ran into the darkness of an adjoining room and immediately barked his shin on something hard. He limped back to the broken base of the stairs.
“We need light,” he said, but Rickard had already freed Ty and the two were tearing open a bundle of torches and candles. The Sarge yanked on the first intact stair but only brought down three more with a crash. He growled darkly, but then shouted some more in what Phin supposed was meant to be a friendly voice.
“Your Grace? This is not what you think. We are Codians, ma‘am.”
He was fingering the hilt of his sword as he said it.
Ty struck steel to flint and Rickard got the first torch lit. Phin snatched it from his hand and ran back into the next room, maneuvering around piles of decrepit furniture and kicking up clouds of fine gray dust as he went.
He passed through two more rooms connected by low stone archways, ducking each time before reaching what must have been a kitchen judging by the sagging counters and a wide fireplace. The archway in the back wall gave into a round nook with stone block steps ascending a shaft. Phin opened his mouth to call back to the legionnaires who he could still hear knocking about back by the front door, then realized that was a terrible idea. He remained silent and slid along the wall up the stairs.
The Sarge’s clear voice from down a hall let Phin know that way led only back to the front of the building, so he moved to the right through another room. He walked across wooden doors lying flat on the floor, as the iron hinges had been scavenged. In the next hall he saw clear marks on the dusty floor and squatted to hold the torch close above them. They were prints of small boots, the Duchess’s size, and they led away in a zigzag fashion. Phin followed. Twice there were more and longer marks where the Duchess had probably stumbled against a wall in the dark and gone down, though she hadn’t stayed there.
The Sarge was now yelling for Phoarty as well as for the Duchess, but Phin made no response. The tracks led him into a long gallery at the rear of the building with the gray quasi-daylight coming in through tall slit windows. There were a lot of tracks in the thick dust here and as Phin looked at them he gasped, for most had not been made by boots. They were of small, naked feet with three splayed toes ending in claws, and a fourth digit extending backward from the heel.
“Sergeant, shut up!” Phin shouted, and the man did so though it took a moment for the echoes of his voice to fade in the stone rooms with their furnishings rotted away. Phin concentrated hard but all he could hear was his crackling torch and his own rapid breathing. He drew the dagger he had taken from the Dead Possum from his belt, though he did not hope to accomplish much with the thing. There had not been a lot of weapons training at Abverwar, mostly memorization of lists of dead kings.
There was a sound behind him and Phin spun. Light flickered from a doorway down the hall and Ty appeared, sword in one hand and torch in the other. Phin beckoned him forward, pointing at the tracks on the ground, and Ty crept into the gallery. The light of his torch shone on the ceiling above him, and Phin screamed.
Clinging to a beam above the legionnaire’s head was something out of a nightmare. It was about the size of a goblin and similar in the narrow torso, long spindly limbs, and bulbous head, but instead of rubbery skin it was covered with yellowed scales the color of old parchment. In place of hands and feet it had four sets of four-fingered claws. All Phin saw of its face was gleaming green eyes above a sort of bony white beak, out of which flicked a forked red tongue. It dropped off of the beam with the speed of a striking adder.
Phin’s shout and wide eyes had been enough warning for Ty to twist away and the thing’s claws only raked across his helmet, one foot snagging the dirty brown Legion plume and tearing it out of its mount. Ty hit the floor and rolled away while the thing remained suspended in the air, hanging upside-down by a narrow tail wrapped whip-like around the beam. It popped the Legion plume into its beak and swallowed with a sucking sound, then dropped off the beam and spun to land on all fours with a puff of dust. Its four claws scrabbled as it scuttled toward Phin.
Phin held his dagger and torch in front of him and backed away as fast as he could go. The thing made a squeaking cry as it followed, alternately rising to its hind legs or moving on all four. Its beak clacked open and shut with a sound like sharpening knives. Phin backed down another short hall, yelling for Ty to get the hell up and kill the thing. He passed into yet another room and heard a sharp intake of breath at his side.
It was the Duchess, who he had plain forgotten about, lurking beside the door with an old table leg raised above her head. Phin said “Don’t,” but she did.
She was not tall enough to swing for Phin’s head but did crack him in the left elbow. The soft old wood burst in a dirty cloud but Phin dropped his dagger, just as the creature sprang at him.
The thing seemed to lack even the rudimentary intelligence to avoid an open flame, and as Phin reeled from the woman’s assault he thrust the torch into the oncoming creature’s face. It squealed and raked two claws through Phin’s shirt without cutting him, but its impact spilled them both to the ground and this time Phin’s head did bang off the floor.
He lay stunned for a moment, torch rolling out of his numb hand to gutter in the dust. He could hear the thing rolling away and scrabbling upright, and see the Duchess staring at it wide-eyed with her mouth twisted in horror, still clutching what was left of her club. Then Ty was there, bounding over Phin and driving at the creature, hacking off one of its claws at the wrist even as another screeched across his breastplate. Phin met the Duchess’s eyes, then both scrambled for his dagger lying between them.
She got to it first but Phin grabbed her wrists by their cord bindings before she could use it, and they rolled together in a tangle, gagging on the dust their struggle raised. Ty and the creature were locked in combat and the Sarge and Rickard were both shouting in different parts of the building. Phin finally managed to get his longer legs under the melee and roll the woman to her back
, forcing her arms over her head with a sharp cry.
“Stop it!” he hissed at her, eyes only inches from hers.
“Let go of me!” she yelled back in accented Codian.
“Woman, listen!” he said in a harsh whisper. “I am the only chance you have of getting away from these men and out of here. Do not fight me!”
She blinked at Phin in confusion, but did not wholly stop struggling. Across the room Ty barked an oath and the little creature hissed gleefully.
“Who are you?” the woman demanded.
“My name is Phinneas.” She made a final squirm, but Phin had her pretty well pinned. “Trust me,” he said. “I am on your side.”
She blinked up at him. “Do you even know what side that is?”
“Not really. But the other one has to be worse.”
“Phoarty, a little help!” Ty called. Phin looked over and saw that while the legionnaire was faring all right, he could not quite land a killing blow on the quick little beast. It scrabbled around him hissing and spitting, bleeding a slimy gel from several wounds but still darting in to swipe at Ty’s legs. Its severed claw lay in the dust, twitching.
“Do not do anything rash until we have a plan,” Phin whispered to the Duchess, then raised himself enough to wrench the dagger out of her bound hands. He rolled off of her with the faintest feeling of remorse not really appropriate to the situation, took up the dagger, and crept up on Ty’s opponent from behind.
Ty met Phin’s eyes and nodded him to the side. Both torches were now on the ground and Ty lunged forward for a stab that the creature avoided only by scampering sideways and putting a claw foot down on one of them. The creature screeched and hopped backwards directly at Phin, and before he had time to think about it Phin plunged the dagger in between its scaly shoulder blades. Hot gore splashed his hands and the creature fell to the ground, hissing and squeaking as all four limbs tried to reach the dagger jammed in to the hilt. Then Ty was on it, yelling and hacking at its head until it finally lay still.
Rickard burst into the room, eyes raking the place. He saw the Duchess by the wall and grabbed her by the bindings on her wrists, twisting them cruelly.
“Don’t ever run off in this place, you stupid wench!” Rickard shouted in her face. She fell forward to her knees and grimaced in pain, but made no sound. Her eyes remained locked on Phin’s.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Uriako Shikashe was the first to step through the mist-shrouded gatehouse and emerge into the round plaza just inside Vod’Adia. Nesha-tari was close behind him. The vendors looked at the grim samurai with his bared white blade and the beige-cloaked woman whose flashing blue eyes returned their looks smugly, and no one felt the need to tout their wares. These people looked like they knew what they were doing.
Amatesu came out next with a pack on her shoulder and carrying an unlit lantern. Tilda followed with an arrow nocked in her short bow. Brother Heggenauer and John Deskata appeared with mace and heavy short sword, both of them armored now as the ex-legionnaire had stripped the breastplate and greaves off of one of his fallen fellows. He also carried, once again, the tall tower shield of the Legions.
The six of them looked around surprised by the market-day atmosphere of the place, and weapons were finally slid back into sheaths or at least rested on shoulders. Nesha-tari crossed her arms and spoke, but no one translated. Everyone looked around.
“Where’s the other guy?” Deskata asked.
“His name is Zebulon,” Amatesu said. Quick introductions had been made once already.
“Whatever. Where is he?”
The samurai grunted and nodded his flaring kabuto helmet back at the gatehouse, where a raised crossbow was just easing out of the dense mist in the passageway. The weapon was followed by Zeb’s head, bushy hair poking out from beneath his Ayzant helmet. He looked around over the bow then lowered it and jogged over to the others with his ring mail jingling.
“I got lost in the gatehouse,” he mumbled.
“It was a straight hallway,” Tilda said. He had no response.
Nesha-tari spoke again, and Zeb translated. The woman’s words sounded like commands but Zeb repeated them as suggestions. She thought everyone should disperse to ask around after the men they were after before setting off into the city.
Brother Heggenauer frowned deeply at the woman as she spoke in Zantish, but he made no comment before striding for a tall building with a white shield freshly painted on the black bricks above the open door. Deskata and Zebulon went off in other directions while the two Westerners remained with Nesha-tari. She crossed her arms and stood on one foot to admire the shiny new, knee-length boot of dark leather on the other. The Shugak had hurriedly provided her with the new footwear, along with some supplies now distributed among the party.
Before she went off on her own Tilda looked over the Westerners. She was guessing that Uriako Shikashe was samurai, but was pretty sure she was right as he carried both katana and wakizashi swords and wore a full suit of o-yori that must have cost a fortune. The woman Amatesu always added the highly respectful suffix -sama to his family name as well. The Western woman had introduced herself with just a single name, but Tilda had seen her heal Zebulon’s throat with only a touch.
“ Shukenja?” Tilda asked Amatesu, and the woman with the wreck of a hair style raised a black eyebrow and nodded.
“Good,” Tilda said.
“You are familiar with the ways of the Western Lands?” the shukenja asked.
“A little,” Tilda said. “I am from Miilark.”
Amatesu looked at Tilda’s black half-cloak.
“Guilder?”
Tilda raised one of her own black eyebrows as she nodded.
“Good,” Amatesu said.
Tilda moved across the plaza and talked to a gnome who tried very hard to sell her a map of the city. He had a smile as wide as Fitzyear Coalmounderan’s but there was a different quality in his eyes. Tilda suspected his maps were fake. He had however seen the legionnaires a few hours ago or so, but not where they had gone. Tilda rejoined the others. Zeb knew no more than she did but Heggenauer said that Shanatarian priests had healed two men in Imperial armor, one from a bad leg wound and another with two fingers cut off.
“I should have picked up the Sarge’s digits for him,” John Deskata growled as he was the last to arrive. His manner now was scarcely anything like it had been while he was calling himself Dugan, and Tilda supposed that this gruff, angry man was the real him.
“There is a bunch of Agintans in that building,” Deskata jerked a thumb. “They saw our boys move off on the first street heading south. I looked around back there but the streets are a maze.”
“What do we know of this heart of Vod’Adia they seek?” Heggenauer asked. Deskata shrugged.
“It is some castle or palace smack-dab in the middle of the city. That’s all the seer could get from the book.”
The party looked to the south and toward the middle of town, but as far as they could see they perceived only rising rooftops and a few towers. Nothing that looked like a castle on its own.
Nesha-tari spoke even as she started walking around the building Deskata had indicated.
“Madame Nesha-tari suggests we discuss this on the move,” Zeb said, following the Westerners who were already following the Zantish woman. “Instead of standing here like a bunch of…well. Never mind.”
Tilda joined them and fell into step beside Brother Heggenauer, the acolyte of Jobe. His handsome face was determined and as he noticed Tilda looking at him he gave her a short smile and a nod.
“Are you going to be in trouble with your temple?” Tilda asked, as she had not had an opportunity to ask him anything since the party had rushed to the Shugak palisade and onto the road into Vod’Adia. Heggenauer shook his head.
“Sister Paveline did not order me directly to stay out. She knows the right thing to do is to go to the Duchess’s aid.”
“She didn’t let any of the other Jobians come in,” Tilda
said. Heggenauer frowned ever so slightly.
“Though our Church practices some military discipline, I was one of the few at the temple raised in Camp Town with…actual experience of a martial kind.”
“Were you a knight?” Tilda asked, as everything about Heggenauer’s manner made that seem likely.
“I was a squire for a time,” he said. “Before I heard Jobe’s call.”
The group had moved out of the plaza and to the next block over. Looking down a street running more or less south Tilda saw what Deskata had meant, for two lanes split off from it on the right side at different angles and the main route disappeared around a corner only a little further on. Looking at the dark, cobblestone surface of the roads and the smooth black flagstones of the sidewalks, Tilda did not think any passersby would leave enough signs to track. She said so and the others slowed and looked around at each other.
“Priest?” Deskata asked Heggenauer. “How about a spell?”
The acolyte of an Imperial Church did not look kindly toward the ex-legionnaire. He shook his head.
“What about you?” Deskata asked Amatesu. The shukenja also shook her head.
“I would need an object belonging to a person I wished to follow.”
Tilda looked at Deskata. He was not wearing the great emerald ring but he surely had it somewhere on his person, probably back on the cord around his neck beneath the dead legionnaire’s breastplate.
“What about an object one of them had carried, or worn, for a few months?” Tilda asked. Amatesu looked thoughtful.
“Perhaps. Though possession is not the same as belonging.”
Deskata ignored her and pointed at Nesha-tari. “And her? She is a mage of some kind, right?”
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