Plague of Shadows

by Howard Andrew Jones

  Drelm waited, scowling. His large eyes roved over her after the guards slammed and barred the door. There was no sign of dawn yet through the window, but Elyana knew that it could not be far off. She felt it in the air.

  "Did they hurt you?" he growled.

  "Not yet. Their questioning's gotten more sophisticated, but they're still tripping over their own arrogance."

  "Do you think they were on the alert for us?"

  "I don't know how," Elyana said. "I suppose we were recognized. It's been twenty years, and they still had an identification poster for me."

  He grunted. "What did you do to make them so angry?"

  "We escorted a lot of frightened people to safety over several years," Elyana answered. "But specifically..." She chuckled. "Specifically, I think we made our biggest impression on our last visit. We escaped with ten prisoners and burned down a few blocks on the way out of town. And some Gray Gardeners along with them."

  Drelm snorted. He opened his mouth as if to say more, then turned suddenly toward the door.

  Elyana heard it a moment later: the tramp of approaching boots in the dungeon corridor. Drelm moved to the window in the door and peered out.

  "Two guards," he said. "One with a lantern. One of those gray cloaked men is walking with them."

  A Gray Gardener, already? She hadn't expected that. If one of them questioned her ...She forced confidence into her voice. "Two guards. Those are better odds."

  "You said the gray men have magic."

  "Pretend you're weaker than you are," Elyana told him. He grunted acknowledgment.

  She feigned nonchalance as she listened to the troupe march forward. Finally the footsteps stopped in front of the door.

  "Leave me," a voice said. A man's voice. Elyana felt a thrill of recognition. Had she heard correctly?

  "If it please your citizenship," one of the guards said gutturally, "I'm not sure we—"

  "I said to leave," the voice repeated sharply, and one of his two companions set the lantern on the floor. Footsteps retreated the way they'd come.

  The Gardener's eyes shone from deep in his mask as he peered through the window in the door. "We've not much time," he said.

  "Nice costume," Elyana told Vallyn. "Did it come with a key?"

  "It came with all kinds of perks," Vallyn answered softly from behind the mask, "but we'd best move fast. The boy and the wizard await us in the stables. I've even managed to recover most of our belongings. Though not, I'm afraid, your ring."

  Elyana winced. "My sword?"

  "In the stables. Now get back. I'm opening the door."

  The bard soon had them out, and passed Elyana's knife over, apologizing that he couldn't have sneaked her sword in.

  "I'm just glad you got in at all." Elyana's eyes passed over the darkened doors. The dungeon hall was long, dark, and narrow. Cell doors stood on either hand. "Who's in the rest of these?"

  "No one right now."

  "You're sure?"

  Vallyn's answer was grim. "They just cleared everyone out yesterday evening."

  He did not mean, she realized, that anyone had been freed.

  "Not as many folk to execute as there were in the old days," Vallyn continued, almost conversationally. "They save them up. More interesting for the crowd."

  "That's thoughtful of them."

  "Now ready yourselves. When we round the next corner there's another door, and there are guards on its other side. I'll go through, and then you two will have to account for at least one of them."

  "It will please me," Drelm said in his low voice.

  Elyana and the half-orc held back from the door as Vallyn rapped on it. The eye panel slid aside and a bearded face peered at them. The door opened swiftly to Vallyn's Gray Gardener costume. The guard on its other side started to close it the moment Vallyn was clear, but Drelm was already charging.

  The half-orc slammed into the door with his shoulder so hard that it swung back and into the wall. He lifted a guard with one hand in a chokehold and smashed him into the wall while the fellow kicked. Vallyn knifed the other when the guard whirled to check on the commotion. By the time Elyana was across the threshold, both guardsmen were down.

  Drelm released his soldier to crash unconscious or dead against the floor.

  "Good enough." Vallyn's eyes swept over the guards. "I'm afraid I'm fresh out of disguise spells at the moment. You might pull on this fellow's coat and hat, my dear. Drelm—"

  "I can wear the other man's hat," Drelm said.

  Vallyn shrugged. "Good enough."

  Elyana took the bard's suggestion, helping herself to the man's sword. Drelm snatched up one himself. The weapons were wide cutlasses, not especially sharp, but better than nothing.

  Their exit from the building proved uneventful. That early in the morning there were no other people in any of the halls, which Elyana supposed was natural enough. Still, the escape seemed too easy, and when Vallyn opened the door to the courtyard she was surprised to learn that it too was empty. A line of lighter darkness glowed faintly on the eastern horizon. Dawn was come.

  Behind them was the prison. To her right were the stables, and on her left a three-story building hung with a regimental banner. Barracks. A wall topped with a walkway and towers stretched between barracks and stables, and below it was a high wooden palisade, closed and barred. A lone figure strode the battlement above the gate, his head turning to take the group in as they walked for the stables, Vallyn still in the rear. The bard had doused the light to help conceal the two who preceded him.

  Renar waited just inside the stables, a liberty cap pulled a little too low over his forehead. Elyana could not help but return his glad smile.

  "Praise Abadar!" the young man said in a stage whisper, then hugged her. He shook the half-orc's hand enthusiastically.

  Kellius smiled at them. "All the gear's packed," he said. "Are you both all right?"

  "We are well," Drelm said.

  Their horses were saddled, Elyana saw, and after nodding a greeting to Kellius she returned Persaily's friendly nicker with a pat on the nose and a few words of praise.

  She had just swung into her saddle when the alarm bell rang. And she'd been concerned that things were going too easily.

  Some loud-voiced scion of liberty was shouting at the same time he clanged a great iron bell from high in the jail, and fine as Elyana's hearing was, even she could not determine what the fellow warned against. His words were lost in the titanic ringing. It was easy to guess, though.

  Vallyn, cursing a blue streak, climbed into his own saddle and led them into the courtyard. He rode with self-assurance, head high, back straight as a polearm. The barracks boiled with activity as soldiers threw on jackets and dashed across the brick courtyard toward both gate and jail. A bugler sounded high, squawking notes to rouse sleeping guardsmen.

  Four soldiers stepped from the gatehouse and halted in front of the thick oaken doors that barred passage from the courtyard. These four wore mailed helms and carried halberds. Their grizzled leader bowed his head briefly to Vallyn as his gaze swept over the rest of them. Elyana's cap was pulled down far over her ear tips, and she squinted to in an attempt to hide her monochrome elven eyes. Drelm slouched in his saddle, trying to look small, and sucked on his lower lips so that his fangs did not show. It lent him a demented and stupid aspect, but in the predawn light he looked human enough. Elyana guessed he was not the only hulking idiot the Galtans had ever seen wearing a liberty cap.

  "We must pass," Vallyn said.

  "The prison bell's rung, citizen," the officer said in a steely voice. "No one comes in or out."

  "Fool," Vallyn said, "the prisoners are out already! We ride to find them!"

  "I have my orders, citizen. No one comes in or out."

  Vallyn leaned forward in
his stirrups, the leather in his boots creaking as he did so. His voice was thick with menace. "If you let the elf girl escape me, citizen, I will have your head. Open the doors and stop quoting laws to me. I am the law."

  The man actually quivered a little, then looked down at the toes of his shoes. He stepped away and waved sharply at his attendants, who scurried to unbar the gates.

  The officer stepped off to the side, watching them.

  Elyana's head swiveled as she took in the scene. Armed with halberds, dozens of guardsmen were forming a square in the courtyard. The bell ringer had finally left off his tolling, which Elyana was momentarily glad for until another Galtan emerged from the stable to shout that someone had tied up the stable hands.

  Renar winced, then gave voice to one of the first curses Elyana had ever heard cross his lips. The chief gate guard's head snapped up and he stared hard at the Gray Gardener before him. His head turned toward the gate guards, mouth opening, but Elyana's sword thrust took him in the throat and he fell, his command unvoiced.

  "Calistria's blessing only works so far," Vallyn said, and with a hearty yell kicked his mount into a gallop.

  The guards had only opened one of the two palisade gates, and that a mere six feet wide, but Vallyn and Elyana were through it before the stunned guards still pushing it grew conscious of anything amiss. Elyana slashed one before he could answer shouts to close them, and Drelm rode the other down. In a moment all five of the companions were riding free into the cobbled streets.

  Vallyn galloped into the main thoroughfare, scattering a militia patrol marching past the guillotine.

  Kellius shouted eldritch syllables and Elyana looked back to see what he wrought. A glowing ball of flickering, shifting flame formed in one of his hands. Still shouting, the wizard hurled the fire at the base of the scaffolding holding the deadly guillotine. It landed amidst the timber and licked hungrily up the wood.

  The wizard's mount was caught up in the thrill of the run with his fellows, or Elyana could guess it would have been more concerned by the shouting. Even a few days ago Kellius wouldn't have had the skill to ride while casting, but his days in the saddle had paid off, and he managed to keep his seat and control his mount. He grinned triumphantly at Elyana, who chuckled merrily in response.

  Vallyn took the corner sharply, then rounded the next. Bells rang throughout the city, warning guards to seal the gates. Long ago, Elyana and Stelan's Galtan contacts had known a hidden way through the walls. Elyana guessed that the resistance would have had to find a new way to freedom, if any significant number of rebels remained. The Galtans were simply too practiced at hunting down their foes.

  Vallyn's course wound them back into the quarter where they'd been captured. The streets were quiet, and the overhanging buildings kept them in deep shadow even as dawn's waking light reached into the urban valleys.

  The bard finally slowed when he rounded onto a street that dead-ended against the gray stone wall of the city, looming mountainously. Thirty feet of sheer climb looked down at them.

  The bard slid from his saddle, smoothly taking the reins and heading through the wide, curtained opening of a one-story building set flat against the wall. Elyana dropped from Persaily and looked behind her. The other three trailed only a few horse lengths back, Drelm bringing up the rear. She strained to listen for signs of pursuit and heard nothing. Strange. The bells still rang from towers spread through the city. She heard the crow of roosters, the lowing of animals and the shouting of people raised early by the racket. But as of yet, no one on this back street stirred.

  She parted the curtains and led Persaily into the building. She doubted the fabric was a standard shop feature and guessed it had been added this morning to conceal whatever Vallyn had set in motion.

  A cold blacksmith's forge stood in the gloom to her left, beneath a row of tools hung from a rafter. The stones beneath her must surely be crowded with various tools during the day, but now a path was swept clear, leading straight to an uneven doorway where a six-foot gap had been opened in the bricks themselves. Vallyn, limned by the light, held the reins of his horse while he spoke softly with a woman in the shadows. The stranger faced Elyana as she neared them, and the elf thought that she looked familiar. An instant later she recognized that the mature woman's features were similar to those of a young, reluctant ally from years before.

  "Nadara," Elyana said in greeting. What was the shadow wizard Lathroft's niece doing here?

  The woman bowed her head. "Hurry," she said softly.

  "You heard her," Vallyn said, tipping his head toward the opening.

  Elyana led Persaily through the gap and leapt to saddle. In a moment more the others were out, and Elyana glanced back in time to see the wall seal behind them.

  There would be time to have her questions answered later. Now there was nothing for it but to ride as far and as fast as their horses could carry them.

  Chapter Ten

  In Among the Kings

  They pushed themselves and their mounts, and by noon they had crossed a bridge over the river Sellen, which was coursing its long way down from the River Kingdoms. They drew up on the windward side of a hill and looked back toward Woodsedge. Elyana kept them from the height, where they would be silhouetted against the sky.

  The humans sank wearily down for a rest. The horses cropped at the grasses. Elyana scanned the distance.

  "No pursuers," Drelm said.

  Renar looked up from the pockmarked boulder against which he leaned. "Vallyn had us cut all the girths and bridles in the stable while we were waiting."

  Drelm produced a strange noise. Elyana glanced at him, saw the half-orc's lips open in a fang-bearing smile, and realized that he was laughing.

  "That can't have stopped all of them," Kellius said. His voice was weary and soft.

  "It hasn't," Elyana answered. "There's a line of cavalry after us. Three or four hours back."

  Drelm narrowed his own eyes. "I don't see anything but hills and woods."

  "You're not Elyana," Vallyn pointed out.

  "I'm glad someone finally noticed," Kellius offered, and Drelm laughed again, then smacked the wizard on the back and laughed more deeply.

  Kellius grinned at him and adjusted his hat. He'd long since discarded his liberty cap.

  "As comfortable as this is," Elyana said, "we dare not rest long."

  After a long silence, during which they all dug rations from their saddlebags, Renar's voice rose, quiet not with fatigue, but with worry. "Are they going to catch us?"

  "We will reach the foothills today." She knew that was not the reassurance Renar was wanting, but could not muster the sympathy to console him. She was exhausted, and even the dried meat was glorious to her as she dropped down beside Renar and tore into it. It was good to be free, with her sword and her bow. Even the old dwarven bracelet wrapped about her upper arm felt good. When she had time later she'd slip the ugly bearded face back under a sleeve.

  Kellius saw her fingering it. "What is that?"

  "A dwarven ornament," Elyana said, then took a long sip of wine. She was delighted to discover it was some fine sweet Galtan vintage.

  "Old, old loot," Vallyn said amiably. "It was probably some stubby dwarf woman's bracelet. It just fits about Elyana's arm."

  Despite his fatigue, the wizard's curiosity was clearly piqued. "What does it do?"

  "It boosts my strength," Elyana said, tearing off another bite of dried meat.

  "You don't seem strong," Drelm said, dubiously.

  "I'm strong enough to lead," Elyana reminded him.

  The half-orc grunted thoughtfully.

  The captain was right, she thought as she sipped her wine. Even with the magic from the bracelet, her strength was nothing remarkable, and she was glad Vallyn had been able to recover the charm. The Galtan wine was smooth down her t
hroat, and she capped the wine sack with reluctance, for she might easily have drained it. "We should preserve our drink. I don't know these mountains. Water could be scarce once we reach the heights."

  "We're not going to the heights, are we?" Vallyn asked, then sighed tiredly at Elyana's answering stare.

  "That was Nadara," Elyana said to him, her gaze unwavering. "What was she doing in Galt?"

  "Who's Nadara?" Renar asked.

  "The woman who helped us escape," Elyana told him without looking over. She was in no mood to catch Renar up on old doings. Not right now. She continued to press Vallyn. "So she's a wizard, like her uncle?"

  "She's not a shadow wizard, Elyana," Vallyn told her. "She's part of the resistance. She has been for years. She just put her life on the line for us tonight. That escape route is ruined now, and so might be the lives of anyone associated with it. Or even those living nearby."

  Elyana's look softened. She nodded.

  "Who's Nadara?" Renar asked again.

  "An old friend," Vallyn said. Elyana heard something in his tone that suggested the woman might be more to him than that, but for once the bard did not elaborate.

  "Thank her for me," Elyana said formally, "when next you see her."

  Vallyn bowed his head. "I shall."

  "And thank you, Vallyn," she said kindly.

  The bard smiled and bowed his head again.

  The whole exchange struck Renar as peculiar. The look in Elyana's eyes when she'd first asked Vallyn about the woman reminded him of the way Elyana had looked at him when he was ten and she'd inquired politely if it was he who'd been trying to punch new holes in the saddle girths with a dagger. Clearly he was missing something, but he did not ask explanation from Elyana, whom he was sure would not answer, and had risen to check over the horses in any case. He chose not to raise the matter with Vallyn, either. Instead he sat down by Kellius.