Dangerous Games

Chapter 12

A hand clamped over Candlemas's mouth, jolting him from a sound sleep, terrifying him. The huge hand pinned his head, rendering him powerless as a child. As he blearily fought for breath and vision, he saw that there were several people hovering around the big canopied bed. Were these assassins?

"Can you remain quiet?"

The voice and barbarous northern accent were familiar, and Candlemas nodded. His heart continued to race, though, as if it would never slow down.

Dragging himself upright, he saw it was indeed Sunbright. With him were a scruffy, short, one-eyed woman with an elven cast to her, and four filthy children dressed in rags and carrying satchels. Questions overrode indignation, though Candlemas pulled the blanket around his ample middle. He slept naked, while these intruders were villainously clothed and armed.

"Where have you been?" the pudgy mage whispered.

"Adventuring." Sunbright talked in a whisper as well. He sat on the edge of the bed and it creaked under his weight. The elvish thief stroked the bedposts and made glowing stripes that cast a wan light.

"I see you've been treated well," the barbarian said, "Can you have food fetched? The children are hungry."

"What?"

Candlemas rubbed his eyes. He noticed that Sunbright had a few new, livid scars and wounds wrapped in dirty bandages, but was otherwise the same.

"Who are these people?" he asked, "How did you get in here? What have you been up to? How have you managed to survive in this city without any money or contacts?"

Sunbright answered with a snort, then, "Get some food and we'll tell you. It's an interesting story. And I'm hungry too."

Grumbling, Candlemas tugged on a robe and rang a bell. While the visitors hid, he ordered a night maid to fetch a platter, enough to last him all day if necessary. She left without a word, returned shortly with a silver platter heaped with loaves of bread, cheese, wine, fruits, cold sausage, raw vegetables and sauces, even delicate jam tarts.

Sunbright and the rest came out of hiding, the children gazing wide-eyed at the food. When told to dig in, they ate like wolves. Sunbright stuffed cold roast into a hollowed loaf and tore off chunks with strong white teeth.

Candlemas took mulled wine, sat in a wing chair, and said, "Now will you tell me what you've been up to?"

Sunbright told him, leaving out nothing. The list of dead guards made the mage shake his head. When the barbarian had finished, Candlemas related some of his work, marveling at the contrast between them. Sunbright battled spidery trackers and killer guards in the sewers while Candlemas perched in luxury and explored esoteric magic. It was hard to believe they spoke of the same city. Candlemas didn't mention Aquesita.

The northerner nodded at Candlemas's observations, as if they confirmed his own suspicions. He picked up a bottle and smashed the neck against the table edge, for he didn't recognize the enchanted corkscrew next to it.

"So this Karsus is the wild-eyed nit who pitched me out into the street? And he just builds magical things and destroys friend and foe alike, and no one stops him?"

"It's even more insane than that," Candlemas sighed. "Karsus has no friends, only slithering toadies who slobber after him like idiot dogs. I suppose he has foes-other mages or archwizards-but they're nothing compared to him. Karsus has whole teams of mages dusting off war machines and enervating them with this new magic. He's like a boy in a sandbox, building tiny cities and stamping on them. And there is no one to stop him. All the archwizards in the city bow to Karsus. He owns whole tracts of the city anyway. He built it. And no one dares speak out for fear of assassination. You remember Lady Polaris?"

"The white-haired woman who got us out of hell?"

Sunbright didn't see Knucklebones's one eye go wide.

"Aye." Candlemas sipped wine. "There's enough of her now for three women. She hides all day in a dark room preening and stuffing herself like a pig. She has no concept of the danger the empire's in, and doesn't care. She's probably representative of all the archwizards."

Sunbright nodded. The children had stuffed themselves until their stomachs were round and their heads drooping. The barbarian ferried them to Candlemas's huge bed. The mage didn't comment on how they dirtied the sheets.

Returning, Sunbright said, "The empire's rotten to the core, and I know, for I've seen the core. I've felt this abuse of nature and magic, and had visions of destruction-whole cities collapsing-so it can't be far off. It emphasizes your words."

Candlemas waved away dreams. Hard facts interested him more, and he had plenty. He found himself echoing Aquesita, defending her position. "It's not all bad, and need not lead to devastation. Magic can be a force for good, too, don't forget. Tamed, it's the most powerful force in the universe. It's Karsus who's abusing it. Were he to disappear, the empire could regain its senses and climb to new heights-"

"No." Sunbright cut him off, shaking his head. "All things come to an end. A tree grows tall and strong, crowding out its neighbors, but it always grows too large eventually, and rot sets in, and the core collapses, and a strong wind knocks it down to destruction. Its children may take root, may survive and grow in their own way and in a new direction, but the tree is dead and gone, its body serves as food for the young ones."

"A simplistic view. Something for a shaman to lecture children with," Candlemas snorted. "The empire has much greatness about it, and it's not dead yet."

What would Aquesita think of those words?

"I may be an ignorant barbarian, but I have eyes." Sunbright nodded toward the bed, where petite snores whistled. "Those children were abandoned by their parents, or orphaned by your empire's guards. A race that feeds on its young won't last more than one generation, let alone forever. And you said yourself no one's opposing Karsus and his cronies."

Candlemas was disturbed by the simple logic. He wondered if Aquesita knew anything of abandoned children. Wondered, too, if she'd ever wanted children of her own? And did he? But he was daydreaming.

"How did you get into the castle?" he asked Sunbright, trying to clear his mind by filling it with a few facts. "It's covered in glyphs at night, and patrolled regularly."

Sunbright nodded to his traveling companion. "This is Knucklebones, another child of your empire, but one it can't kill. She sneaked us in here. Actually, the children had no trouble either. I'm the clumsy one."

"How do you do?" said the mage formally. Knucklebones only nodded. Rising, she left the table and slipped out into the hall. "Where's she going?"

The barbarian raised his palms. "I've no idea. I ask her questions, and sometimes she answers. She's had a hard life."

Haven't we all, thought Candlemas unkindly, saying nothing but, "So what are you about?"

"We're hiding." Sunbright sorted through the food as he spoke, looking for whatever would keep and storing it in a haversack. "I've killed so many of the city guards I suppose I'm an outlaw, though I don't think any have escaped me to report back. Your city's guards are the scum of the earth. They'd crush a child's skull under their boots and turn it in for a bonus."

"It's not my city," Candlemas corrected. But he thought of Aquesita. It was her city, the good parts anyway.

For answer, Sunbright only looked around the opulent suite lit by stripes of white light. The mage found himself stammering, "Karsus is-is grateful we, uh, retrieved the, uh, fallen star, is all."

Sunbright grinned like a wolf. "I've got scars and dead companions to attest to his gratitude."

Miffed, Candlemas banged down the goblet. "To get back. What are you about?"

Sunbright popped grapes in his mouth, then used a goblet of spring water and a satin napkin to swab grime off his wounds. "I'd like to get down to the ground with these little ones. It's not safe in the city for us. For some reason Knucklebones can't guess, the guards actually expended time and coin to fashion those spider golems to kill us. I'd like to ask you-please-to work your shifting spell and get us down to earth. We can't use a transgate, whatever that is, according to Knucklebones. But we must leave, so we came to you for help, though we'll be parting company now."

There was a touch of regret in his voice.

Candlemas was surprised by a pang too. Sunbright was not exactly a friend, but was more than an acquaintance, and a familiar link to the past. Certainly Candlemas had no friends here. Except Aquesita.

Thought of one woman made him think of another. "What about Greenwillow?"

"Greenwillow…" Sunbright breathed the name as if it contained his soul, "… I don't know. We're so far out of our time-"

"Have you thought of returning?"

The barbarian jerked, dropped his filthy napkin.

"Is that possible?"

Candlemas had surprised himself again.

"Well," the pudgy mage answered, "it just popped into my head. I don't know… Karsus brought us here with a chronoma-a time travel spell. I'd heard stories about the concept, everyone had, but never seen or read of it done. Yet he seemed to do it on a whim, so it must be doable. What I don't know is: can I do it?"

"Or get Karsus to do it?" Sunbright offered. "Or show you how?"

The mage rubbed his bald head, rose, and paced. "I don't even know if Karsus even knows anymore how he did it. Half his magic is instinctual. He simply imagines a spell and it happens. They say he could firefinger-a cantra-at age two. At twenty-two, he was the youngest archwizard ever, and now he's three hundred and something!"

Sunbright squinted. He'd known that mages lengthened their lives magically, but hadn't realized how much. To him, and his people, sixty years old was ancient.

Candlemas continued to pace in bare feet. "If I could convince Karsus," he thought aloud, "-if I could get near him-I might be able to learn the spell. Might… their magic is so advanced here, I should be lucky to scrub tables."

Sunbright nodded, for the first time realizing how tough Candlemas actually had it. In a way, he was a barbarian among mages.

"But you could learn it? And send us back-"

"Us?" Candlemas stopped him. "I don't want to go back!"

"You don't? Why? If you're an ignorant peasant here and an important man back there? And this empire's going to crash around your ears. What's keeping you here?"

Candlemas wouldn't answer, though her name was on his tongue. Aquesita. Even her name was heavenly.

"Never mind. I'll try to learn the spell, and well work out a way to stay in touch. In the meantime, I can get you down to the ground. I think."

"We don't want to go to the ground," retorted a low voice.

The men turned, startled. Knucklebones had opened and shut the door and walked up behind Candlemas without either of the two men noticing. A bulging sack hung over one slim shoulder. She set it down with a chink.

Sunbright nodded. "What's in there?"

"Nothing that'll be missed, much. We're not going down to the ground. You can go by yourself."

"We've decided this already," Sunbright sighed. "On the way here. You said the city is making a special effort to kill you, or me, or both of us, though we don't know why. It won't be safe anywhere. We must get down-"

"I can buy us safety for months with this." She cut him off, then nudged the bag with her bare toe. "Go without us. We wouldn't like it in the wilds. We're used to the city."

"Used to the city?" Sunbright's voice rose. "Living in tunnels like rats? I can find us a friendly village, maybe even the descendants of the Rengarth. Or we could build a cabin, let the children run free in the woods, teach them to swim in mountain pools, see they eat good, healthy red meat and grain still warm from the fields."

Knucklebones didn't answer. At the bed, she pulled back the covers and roused the children. Still more asleep than awake they nevertheless rolled out of bed and picked up their meager belongings. The thief opened a carved chest against one wall, pulled out expensive and ornate clothing that had been hand stitched to Candlemas's measurements. Summoning the sleepy children, she stripped each of their dirty old rags and fitted them with warm, serviceable clothing, the many folds of cloth tucked and belted. Seeing they'd picked up their dolls and satchels again, she retrieved her sack of hard currency and, without a word, slipped out the door, leading the four children by the hand.

Sunbright shrugged his heavy shoulder scabbard and belt into place and grabbed up a last loaf. "I go with them. We'll come back once she thinks it's safe-and we've worked out our differences."

But Candlemas, who didn't believe in omens, had a sudden premonition of disaster. Maybe it was the black night, maybe the wine, but he worried. "Wait!" he called, "Take something so I can find you."

Sunbright stood in the doorway. "Make it fast. Knucklebones could outrun a reindeer on the flats."

Frantic, Candlemas cast about, finally reached behind his ear and ripped loose a tuft of his meager hair. He closed it in the barbarian's palm. "Burn that if you need me. Then get up high somewhere."

Sunbright nodded, and with his belt knife, cut a lock of hair so blond it was almost white. Handing it to Candlemas, a strange wistful look crossed his face. He shot out a massive, scarred, and calloused hand, and gave the mage a squeeze that bruised the skin, whispering, "Thank you, friend."

Then he was gone, and Candlemas was left alone to wonder about many things, but about himself most of all.

Knucklebones made three turns in the dark, then ordered Sunbright to break an inside shutter. They slipped through the window into a garden. The barbarian was amazed at her ability to track inside, in the dark. He couldn't have found his way outside in an hour, and she'd chosen a different route from the one through which they'd entered.

Along a path under dark trees they tripped, Sunbright the noisiest one in his moosehide soles, which were wearing thin with all this pavement walking. The tundra dweller knew only that they tended downhill until he looked up at the stars. Bad enough to be floating in the air, but the entire island revolved ever so slowly, constantly confusing his sense of direction. But the stars at least were fixed, though this was a southern sky. The Sled and Cappi's Cat were stretched lengthwise along the northern horizon.

Knucklebones and the children had disappeared around a corner. The stargazer had to trot to catch up. He found Knucklebones perched like an alley cat between the spears of a wrought iron fence. She reached down and caught the children by the scruff to haul them over. Sunbright admired her quiet strength, her calm poise. He grabbed the spears to vault up and over, but she stiffened, sniffing the air.

Abruptly she pushed Sunbright back down, then hissed to the children as she handed them the loot sack, "Get to Sleeping Gunn! He'll take you in." Then she hopped down beside Sunbright, snagged his vest front, and led him along the fence to a globe-lit corner.

He asked, "Why are we going where it's light?"

"Lead them away from the children!"

Without pause, she dashed across the street into an alley. "Pull that hammer," she whispered. "We'll need it."

"Who's coming?" he asked. Her tension was catching.

She vaulted a puddle that Sunbright splashed through.

"Trackers!" she breathed. "Rushworth and Pericles's crowd!"

Sunbright hadn't seen or heard anyone. He could see even less in this black alley. He started to whisper, "How did you-"

"They've a special soap they wash in to remove human scent. But nonhumans can smell the soap."

She ducked down an alley just as dark as the first and up three long steps. Sunbright could barely keep from falling. She was fleet and nimble as a deer, and with only one eye, he marveled.

He ran into her thin, bony arm, blocking his path.

"In here."

She jerked open a door and they passed within. Sunbright smelled polished wood and dust, books, a trace of food grease. It was no combination he knew. "Where are we?"

"Academy of Mentalist Study. A college. It's always open, but they'll know that too. Suck in your gut!"

"Who? Why?"

As they edged around a wooden corner, Sunbright felt bile burp at the back of his throat. His head felt empty, as if he'd suddenly been hung upside down again. He could tell from barely audible echoes that the room was large, and they were not alone. Knucklebones was counting shelves as they passed.

A light flared in the center of the room.

Sunbright gulped. He thought "center," because the room used all six surfaces as floors. The room was huge, taking up the whole building like a cave, and intermediate floors had been built here and there, jutting from other floors at angles. Bookshelves stood head high on every floor, and open spots with tables and chairs broke up the center. Above their heads on an in-between floor, like a fly stuck to the ceiling, was a man with a fierce red beard and horsetail, and dark, unadorned clothes. He flicked his fingers and sent more balls of glowing energy spinning through the room. So Knucklebones wasn't the only one who could illuminate with her fingertips. With his free hand he tapped a silver coin on his belt.

"You're getting slow, Knuckle'," the man offered. "I got ahead of you."

Knucklebones didn't argue, only fled between bookshelves, leapt like a mountain goat, and gained another "floor." Chasing her, Sunbright was staring at the top of her head for an instant, then he stumbled and righted himself on what had been a wall. His eyes and stomach liked none of it, but he kept running.

To no avail. Every floor had a door looking out on a corridor, and each doorway was blocked by a man or woman. Green capes were thrown back to reveal a skull and crossbones painted on their black shirts. In the eerie light of the drifting glowlights, the crossed bones showed jagged breaks. Knucklebones backed into Sunbright.

The redheaded man quit the left-hand floor, strolled to a doorway, and slipped past an assassin. Sunbright assumed the tracker had found them, and now came the killing. The assassins toted either crossbows with silver-tipped quarrels or long bullwhips forked at the ends like a snake's tongue.

One of the assassins, a woman with blonde hair pulled back tightly, called, "You can leave, Knucklebones. The Bonebreakers have no quarrel with you, and you're not in the contract."

Sunbright drew Harvester and looked for a screen against crossbow bolts. It wasn't easy to find one, for the glowlights cast wide, square shadows that chased one another. This was a bad place for a flatlander to be fighting, he thought.

But even as his brain began to sing with a battle high, he marveled that Knucklebones knew every building in the city inside and out, and that everyone knew her.

The thief called, "Who bought you?"

The blonde shook her head while snapping the safety off her crossbow. But behind her came a crow of laughter. A young fop in a brocaded shirt, satin cape, small hat, and face powder stepped out. He panted, obviously having run to see the show.

"I hired them! Same as I bought the cooperation of the city guards. You killed a fistful of them, didn't you? But they wiped out your nest, I hear!"

For once, Knucklebones didn't know somebody. She asked Sunbright, "Who?"

"Hurodon, son of Angeni of the House of Dreng in the Street of the Golden Willows," growled the barbarian. "My biggest mistake so far. I should have torn his head off in the park."

Hurodon laughed. "If she's your friend, I'll pay for her too!"

The blonde woman nodded, called, "Sorry, Knuckle'. Nothing personal. Loose!"

As the four crossbows shot, Sunbright shoved Knucklebones headlong into a rack of books. The freestanding shelves had no backs, and the barbarian shoved hard. The thief catapulted into the books, knocked them out the other side, and tumbled after them. At the same time, Sunbright used the impetus of his shove to backpedal out of harm's way.

The four bolts arrived almost simultaneously, and acted like nothing Sunbright expected. They were mad as the rest of the room.

One bolt thumped a book sliding across Knucklebone's back. The red book was thick as a knapsack, yet the bolt penetrated so the head projected out the other side. A second bolt Sunbright spanked away with the flat of his blade. It shattered and clattered off the bookshelves. The third he never saw, for he was distracted by the fourth.

Unbelievably, he saw it strike the wooden floor but not break. Instead it ricocheted, bending in a curve for an instant to speed at him. A slap and sting banged his ham, and he knew he was shot. It was painful as a bear's bite. But it was a small bolt, and if he broke off the head "Don't break it!" Knucklebones screamed, diving through the bookshelf at him. "It digs itself deeper! Hold still!" And she yanked the barb free, the head bloody and clinging to shreds of Sunbright's meat. That hurt, like fire jabbed into a wound.

From somewhere he heard, "Close! Nock!"

"Split up!" Knucklebones yelled. Headlong she dived over the heap of books to take refuge in partial shadows.

"No!" shouted the barbarian. But she'd whisked out of sight.

Cursing, he knew why she'd done it. Thieves didn't fight, they fled. And if one of the gang were caught, splitting up would see the others free. So be it. He didn't have time to argue.

He ducked, then skidded on his boots and aching butt around the end of a bookcase. At the command, "Loose!" he jerked the bookcase down onto himself.

An enchanted bolt slammed the floor by his head, bent and spanked into the air. But it only tagged a cascading book, nicking the corner and spinning away. Another bolt splintered a wooden shelf.

A third ripped through his thigh.

Gasping at the searing pain, he reached behind his thigh, grabbed the shank of the arrow-it was made of some queer, pliable material unlike anything he'd ever felt-and ripped downward.

As if watching someone else suffer, he saw the black fletching protruding through his thigh disappear into the tanned flesh. A flare of agony blazed through him, then the arrow was clear. He hurled it away, red with his blood, sucked wind, and struggled up to find two assassins with whips closing at either hand. And Knucklebones nowhere in sight.

Sunbright tracked both of the assassins, flicking his head from side to side. He pushed the pain in his thigh out of his mind. Of course, it wasn't the first time he'd been shot with an arrow. As a boy, practicing, learning with the other boys, he'd often limp home, his aching body resembling nothing less than a pin cushion of little toy arrows. But then, these weren't toy arrows…

Keeping Harvester poised before him to strike either way, he tried to anticipate the assassins' next move. But these two, a man and woman, had worked together before.

At a "Hup!" they both curled their arms and lashed out perfectly in time. The black coils snapped at Sunbright, too close to his eyes. He jumped, but was caught by both wrists. Immediately, like wranglers taming a wild horse, they set their feet and pulled with the full weight of their bodies. Sunbright fought to keep from being spread-eagled, but he knew this was just a delaying tactic. They were merely holding him for — here they came. Two crossbowmen jogging through the stacks of books to aim and pierce him through.

He was pinned, surrounded, helpless and about to be shot. There was no way out.

Then he remembered. There was one more way…