The Shattered Mask

Chapter 13

Bileworm had spent much of his existence in proximity to colossal fortresses built of iron, basalt, and sorcery, but even he had to admit that the playhouse called the Wide Realms presented a pleasing spectacle, if only in a tawdry, terrestrial sort of way. The entrance to the theater, a ring-shaped structure with a tiring house and stage at the rear and a pair of multi-level galleries curving out and around to meet at the gate in the front, shone like a jewel in fields of magical light, as did the gaudy pennants flying and banners hanging from the thatched roof. The humbler patrons had all packed inside prior to the start of the performance, but a few aristocrats were still arriving, pulling up in their carriages, on horseback, or strolling behind torch-bearing linkboys in scarlet capes. Music, the declamations of the actors, and, periodically, applause, cheers, laughter, catcalls, and booing, drifted up through the open space in the center of the building.

Of course, Bileworm hadn't come to admire the view but to scout the disposition of the enemy, and having accomplished his task, he supposed he'd better return to Master and report. He turned and skulked along the rooftops, a shadow moving virtually invisibly against the night sky, until, lengthening and then shortening his leg, he stepped lightly down into the alley where the wizard and his mortal henchmen waited.

Garris Quinn, clad tonight in a plum-colored hat with an upturned brim and yellow plume, a loose, thigh-length mandilion overcoat in the same colors, and baggy galligaskin breeches, glanced around, discovered Bileworm leering at his elbow, yelped, and recoiled.

Not the least bit startled by his aide's outburst, or at least not betraying it if he was, Master casually turned toward his familiar. "What have you learned?" the masked wizard asked.

"They're guarding the lad," Bileworm said, "just as you expected. They have warriors hiding in four buildings adjacent to the Wide Realms, six to ten in each detachment. I imagine other guards are waiting inside the playhouse."

"Thank you for giving us the benefit of your tactical expertise," said Master, a hint of impatience perceptible in his tone. He'd been out of sorts since Thamalon Uskevren's eldest boy had escaped him earlier that day. "Then it's a trap," Garris said uneasily. Master sighed. "I'm surrounded by strategists, it seems. Naturally it's a trap. Did you think that with young Talbot's parents missing, and his brother already assaulted, his retainers would let him wander off to do his acting unprotected? But we're going to trap the trappers."

Garris nodded. "All right. Do we attack?" The bravos massed behind him stirred.

"Not yet," said Master. "Since I want to neutralize all the warriors outside without giving any of them a chance to warn their compatriots inside, Bileworm and I will attend to that particular chore by ourselves while you fellows wait here."

The spirit sniggered. "I thought you promised I could take it easy from now on."

"All you have to do is lead me to the guards," Master replied, "so it shouldn't tax your stamina unduly. Specifically, I want you to guide me to the aspects of the watch posts opposite the Wide Realms. Presumably, the soldiers are all peering out at the playhouse, and if we approach their positions from behind, they shouldn't see us coming."

Bileworm grinned. "Consider it done." He escorted Master to the improvised sentry station on the east side of the theater, a candlemaker's shop. The familiar assumed the warriors had paid the proprietor, his family, and any apprentices to clear out for the evening.

Unfortunately, the establishment had no back door. "You could climb in through a window," Bileworm whispered.

"I might make noise," Master replied, his voice equally low. "Let's try a little magic."

The wizard removed a pinch of sesame from one of the pockets in his dark blue mantle, swept his hand in an intricate mystical pass, and whispered a sibilant tercet. The air in the vicinity rippled for a moment, like hot desert air birthing a mirage, then a round hole appeared in the wall of the shop.

Master slipped inside. Bileworm followed and found himself in a storeroom, with tubs of beeswax and tallow sitting about. Voices murmured through the doorway leading to the front of the shop.

The wizard took out a blowpipe, tiptoed to the opening, raised the weapon to his lips, and puffed explosively. Bileworm watched several armed men fall unconscious; the unlucky ones who'd been standing thumped down to the floor. After a moment, two of them started to snore.

"I concocted this dust when I was young, and used up most of it before my death," Master remarked. "I was pleasantly surprised to return thirty years later and find the rest still in its jar. I guess no one else in the family knew what it was,"

"Are we going to kill these mortals?" Bileworm asked. Master sighed. "I wish you'd grow up a little. We have riper fruit to pick. Come on, we'll go back out through the hole."

As they made their exit, Bileworm reflected that Master simply lacked panache. Yes, they had no need to murder the slumbering warriors. Yes, it would require a few moments that might be spent more efficiently elsewhere. Yes, the method he had in mind would cause a stir when they'd already resolved to be stealthy. But still, with all the combustibles on hand, the candlemaker's shop could be made to burn magnificently, and the heat would almost certainly wake the soldiers up in time to perish in agony in the flames.

Deploring a squandered opportunity, the spirit led Master to the other watch posts. The warriors stationed to the south and west succumbed as easily as the first detachment, but matters fell out a bit differently at the last stop on their circuit, a fragrant perfumery, the shelves behind the counter lined with porcelain and crystal bottles. After the blowpipe discharged its contents, one warrior remained on his feet, a lean, middle-aged man with a stern, humorless mouth, pale, narrow eyes, and a grizzled widow's peak. Judging from the markings on the blue surcoat he wore over his mail, he was probably Jander Orvist, captain of the Uskevren household guard.

Though surely startled by the sudden collapse of his men, Jander nonetheless reacted quickly. He drew his long sword and charged the wizard. Giving ground, Master plucked a packet of folded paper from his mantle, brandished it, and spoke a word of power.

Jander was only a stride away from being close enough to attack when the spell took hold. A smear of slick white slime materialized beneath his boots. Slipping, he cut at the wizard anyway, a stroke that would have landed had not Master parried it with his staff. Purple radiance sizzled from the black wood, down the blade of the long sword, and into Jander's body, playing about his armored limbs as he fell.

Twitching and shuddering, Jander tried to flounder back to his feet, made it as far as his knees, and, realizing he could go no farther, drew in a ragged breath to shout. Master rattled off a brief incantation and spun his arm in an intricate gesture that ended with him planting his hand on the fallen captain's shoulder.

Magenta light and a kind of ragged darkness flickered about the point of contact. His mouth drawn in a rictus of agony, Jander convulsed and then collapsed, his sinewy warrior's body now withered to little more than skin and bones.

Bileworm leered. "He should have skipped off to dreamland with his men."

"He couldn't," Master replied, "his spirit was too strong." Evidently having run out of dust to charge it, he set the blowpipe down atop the counter. "Let's fetch Garris and the others."

Brom had been to the theater before, but had generally found himself in the cheap seats far back from the stage, or even squashed in the press of groundlings standing in the open area in front of it. It was still a novel experience to sit up close with plenty of elbow room in a box overlooking the stage, and he wished he had the leisure to enjoy it.

But he didn't. Like the warriors in mufti stationed about the playhouse, he had to watch for the first signs of an attempt on Master Talbot's life.

He would have found it easier had all the members of the audience been content to sit or stand and watch the performance. Unfortunately, however, the Wide Realms was a raucous carnival of diversions, of which the tragedy unfolding onstage sometimes seemed the least compelling. People were chattering to their friends, munching pears and sausages, passing wineskins and jugs of ale and applejack around, playing cards, throwing dice, tossing a knife in a game of mumblety-peg, and conducting assignations with their sweethearts or bawds. It all combined to make a shifting, churning confusion, in which even the most blatant sign of hostile intent might go unnoticed for a few moments. Brom worried that for all their vigilance, he and his comrades would fail to spot it in time.

Yet when trouble erupted, it did so in the one place where no one could have missed it, on the stage itself.

A shaggy white wig on his head and long, snowy whiskers gummed to his chin, leaning heavily on his gnarled staff, Talbot railed at his absent son for betraying him. Some of the groundlings yelled to tell him that no, the prince was faithful, the evil counselor had lied, but of course the deluded old monarch Talbot was portraying mustn't hear them, or else it would ruin the story.

The part of King Imre was a departure for Tal, who was usually cast in secondary roles that showed off his theatrical fencing more than his acting ability, and he was enjoying the challenge, though not as much as he might have if he weren't waiting for someone to try to murder him. In the wings, Mistress Quickly and some of the other players watched his performance with encouraging smiles.

Behind them sat an iron cage, a prop, but also Tal's prison on nights of the full moon. He thought briefly how odd, even sad, it was that he'd never felt able to tell his own family of his transformations, yet had nonetheless confided in the members of the troupe. Perhaps it was because, while he didn't necessarily love them any more than he did his parents, Tazi, or even Tamlin, he supposed, he trusted his fellow players not to judge him.

A chorus of shouts jarred him from his momentary reverie. For a second, he thought the groundlings were still trying to enlighten old Imre about his heir, then realized they were crying, "Look up! Look up!"

Nothing in the scene should have provoked such an outburst. He turned, lifted his head, and beheld a pair of black spiders, each as big as a donkey, leaping down from the balcony stage above.

The only other actor on stage was Lommy, playing the role of Imre's court fool. His fantastic yellow motley and clown makeup concealed the fact that he wasn't human but a tasloi, with the greenish skin, thin black fur, golden eyes, and apish frame of his kind. When he spotted the spiders, he fled.

Talbot was relieved to see his unarmed friend take himself out of harm's way. He was confident that neither of the spiders would chase after the tasloi, because these were clearly summoned creatures like the ones Tamlin had encountered, charged with the task of killing one specific victim.

Since Tal was that victim, he reached for the long sword hanging at his side. Brom had cast a glamour on it to keep anyone from seeing it, but it became visible as it scraped clear of the scabbard. The noble wore a brigandine as well, the armor concealed beneath Imre's crimson robes.

The spiders scuttled toward him, and he willed himself to be calm. Certain members of the audience were screaming, some sincerely, others in the giddy manner of folk relishing an imaginary peril. Apparently, unfazed by the fact that the sick, doddering old king had inexplicably turned into a swordsman, or that giant arachnids invading the royal palace would seem to have nothing to do with the rest of the plot, these latter assumed the spiders were part of the show.

Fortunately, the hideous creatures didn't work in concert as men might have done. They came at him separately, and one closed the distance before the other. Hoping to dispatch it before its comrade entered the fray, Talbot lunged at it at once.

His blade sank deep into the spider's mask, bursting two of its clustered, globular eyes, but the creature kept scuttling forward, drops of oily amber venom glistening at the ends of its fangs.

Talbot scrambled out of the spider's path, ripped the long sword free, and, knowing he could have at most a second or two left before the other arachnid pounced at him, cut at the place where the wounded creature's head joined its thorax.

The blow half severed the head. The spider continued to turn in his direction, and he feared he still hadn't killed it.

Then it crumpled.

Tal heard footsteps drumming up behind, spun around, and cut. His sword sheared off one of the second spider's chitinous front legs. The arachnid lurched off balance for a moment, then scuttled toward him scarcely less nimbly than before.

Shouting a battle cry, Talbot lunged to meet it, and his point slammed deep into the center of the spider's pulsing mouth. It still kept coming, ramming into him, knocking him down, and crouching on top of him. Heedless of the fact that it was driving his blade even deeper inside its body, the creature dipped its head and bit him. Talbot went rigid with terror, but only felt a pressure, not the agony he'd expected. The steel plates riveted on the brigandine kept the poisonous fangs from penetrating his flesh on the first try, and the spider never got a second. Rather, it convulsed and slumped on top of him.

Tal clambered out from beneath the carcass and yanked the long sword free. Some members of the audience were still cheering and whooping, but more were now screaming in earnest. The noble peered about, trying to make out the totality of what was going on, and why none of his retainers had yet rushed to his aid. He was still struggling to sort out the chaos before him when he heard the door at the rear of the stage bang open, and something scratching and scrambling in the balconies above. He pivoted and came on guard.

Galvanized by the appearance of the spiders, Brom sprang from his chair, spun the head of his staff in a mystic pass, and began to recite an incantation that would launch darts of destructive force at the creatures. Then something, perhaps a sight half-glimpsed from the corner of his eye, perhaps simply an intuition honed in scores of battles, warned him that he was in danger. Abandoning his conjuration, he threw himself flat.

Crossbow bolts whizzed over his head and cracked into the walls. An instant later, a blast of cold swept over him, so bitter that he cried out, and his body clenched. Had it struck him squarely, it might have stopped his heart or frozen him solid, but the paling at the front of the box shielded him from the worst of it.

Shivering, wishing his foe had chosen to strike at him with any force other than cold, Brom fumbled a flake of turtle shell from one of his pockets, rattled off an incantation that would protect him from any more quarrels, then peeked over the rime-encrusted paling.

From that vantage point, he could see that the wizard in the crescent-shaped mask, a number of bravos, and more conjured servitors, giant spiders and the potbellied, long-armed creatures called ettercaps, had burst in through the front entrance. All the wizard's minions were trying to work their way toward the stage and Talbot. Due to the press of the panicking crowd, the ruffians were finding it hard going, but the summoned creatures, clambering along the palings at the front of the middle and upper galleries, were covering the distance more rapidly. The Uskevren guards had taken out their crossbows and swords and were doing their best to slay the attackers, and a few other courageous members of the audience had elected to engage them as well, but the defenders were too few to hold back the tide. Brom wondered what had happened to the soldiers stationed outside the playhouse. Why hadn't they intercepted the masked wizard and his accomplices before the villains ever made it past the gate, and why weren't they charging in after them now?

Brom really had no time to puzzle over their absence, nor to hurl his magic against any of the spiders, ettercaps, or bravos, either, because the masked wizard had cast an enchantment of flight and risen above the crowd. His dark blue mantle fluttering about him, purple fire dancing on the black staff he held above his head, he was soaring directly toward Brom.

"I suspected I'd see you again," the masked man said. Assuming that the other wizard had once again armored himself against lesser spells, Brom hastily attempted one of the greater. Snatching out a handful of clear glass marbles, he raised them high and rattled off the proper incantation. The orbs exploded into powder, veils of shimmering ruby light coiled through the air, and then a corona of brighter radiance blazed around the masked man's head.

Brom peered intently, trying to judge the effect. If the charm had worked, it had robbed the other wizard of the ability to cast spells by stripping away most of his intellect, and the change would likely manifest itself immediately, in a wail of anguish, perhaps, or a general appearance of confusion.

But the masked man simply kept gliding closer as gracefully as before. "You're good," he said in his mild, dry voice, "but I fancy I was better even before my death, and I've learned all manner of tricks in the years since. Allow me to demonstrate."

Green and purple lightning crackled down the length of his staff.

Crouched on the roof of the Soargyl family's box, Thazi-enne had been feeling smug till the trouble began. Her brothers, Erevis, and Brom had been idiots to think they could hold her prisoner and hog all the excitement of unknown enemies, attempted assassinations, and the ensuing battles for themselves. It had been simplicity itself to slip out the casement in her bedchamber and climb down the wall. Afterward, she'd hurried to the Kit, the inn where she kept a room, weapons, and an outfit of dark, oiled, close-fitting leather, suited up for action, and then headed to the Wide Realms. The playhouse wall was considerably easier to scale than that of Stormweather Towers, and once she reached the roof, she had only to avoid rustling the snowy thatch while she found a perch on one of the solid rafters underneath. Tazi hunkered down, watched, and waited.

It only took Talbot a few seconds to kill the first two spiders, but by then, all manner of interesting things were happening. Three more arachnids were making their way onto the stage, as were a pair of swordsmen. A veritable horde of bravos and conjured creatures had pushed in through the front gate. The wizard in the moon mask was flying through the air, heading straight toward the Uskevren family box where Brom was stationed.

Thazienne's first impulse was to rush down onto the stage and fight alongside her hulking brother, but aspects of the situation unfolding below nagged at her. For one thing, as she could see from her elevated position, none of the soldiers positioned outside the playhouse was rushing toward it, which meant that Tal and his supporters were severely outnumbered. For another, since the enemy had evidently found a point of entry at the back of the tiring house, why had the majority of them come in through the gate at the opposite end of the playhouse, placing themselves considerably farther away from their quarry than necessary?

She could conceive of one explanation. The wizard in blue was a commander who planned for contingencies and did his best to control his opponents' actions. The spiders and ruffians already onstage were no feint but a deadly serious threat. But suppose Talbot somehow disposed of them all before their fellows reached the stage. Then, with the bulk of his retainers having mysteriously failed to appear, and an overwhelming force charging toward him, he would see no option but to flee in the only logical direction: back toward that door at the rear of the theater. Where, Tazi suspected, an ambuscade awaited him.

If she was mistaken, if no one was lurking there, she would have wasted valuable time that she could have spent helping Tal fend off the attackers who had already reached him. If she was right, then someone had to clear away the trap and provide him a means of egress, or he'd never make it out of the playhouse alive.

Running lightly, trusting her thief's agility to keep her feet on the sturdy beams beneath the flimsy thatch, she dashed to the rear of the Wide Realms and peered downward. As she'd anticipated, there was an open door there, and clustered around it, half a dozen ettercaps. Four clung higher up on the wall like ticks attached to the hide of some unfortunate host; the pair directly above the exit appeared to be clutching a net. The other two crouched on the ground on either side of the door, ready to attack Talbot the instant he plunged through.

Other than observing captured specimens in carnivals and menageries, Tazi had no firsthand experience with ettercaps, but it was her understanding that the brutes were adept at laying snares and catching unwary woodsmen unawares. That was probably why the masked wizard had selected them for this duty, but she was going to show them what sneaking and attacking by surprise were truly all about. She silently swung her legs over the edge of the roof, then hesitated.

What if everyone was right? What if she actually wasn't well yet, nor ready for a fight to the death against superior numbers?

Scowling, she thrust the timorous thought away. She was recovered, curse it, and even if she wasn't, it didn't matter, not with Talbot's life in jeopardy. She started down the wall.

In some ways, it was the most challenging climb she'd ever attempted. She had to find her hand- and footholds in the dark, then transfer her weight in utter silence, lest the ettercaps hear her coming. Yet she also had to descend quickly, for if she took too much time, she might well engage the foe too late to do Talbot any good.

She held her body well away from the wall. Took care that no matter how she exerted herself, her breathing didn't become audible. Meanwhile she could feel her heart pounding, and half feared that the ettercaps would hear it beating. Or else one of them would simply happen to glance upward, and all her efforts at stealth would be in vain.

None of them did. Compelled by the masked wizard's power, they kept watching the door with a single-minded intensity, and at last Tazi reached a point just above the ettercap hanging highest on the wall.

The creature was suspended head down. A pity, that, for she would have preferred to kick it in its vaguely equine skull, right between the long, pointed ears with the tufts of bristles on the ends. But the base of its spine was in easy reach, and she stamped on it with all her might.

Bone crunched; the ettercap screamed and fell from its perch. One of its fellows skittered around to orient on Tazi. Twisting, she kicked at that one, too, and the reinforced toe of her boot caught it in its red-eyed face, snapping the two tusks that protruded over its lower lip and jolting its head back. The brute tumbled to the ground.

Now that Thazienne no longer had the advantage of surprise, it would be foolish to continue trying to fight and hang on a vertical surface at the same time. She sprang away from the wall, landed well beyond the two ettercaps crouched on the ground, dropped, and rolled through a frigid snow drift.

The net flew through the air. She rolled again, and it clattered down beside her. As she scrambled up, the two ettercaps who'd thrown it hopped down from their perches, and then, screeching and chittering, all four of the uninjured ones shambled toward her.

She knew she mustn't let them encircle her. She whipped out her long sword, dodged to the left, then sprang at her closest opponent.

The ettercap raked at her with the filthy claws at the ends of its elongated fingers. She ducked beneath the attack.

The poison glands in its upper lip swelling, the creature lunged to bite her, and she met the threat with a cut that bisected its throat.

As the ettercap toppled, she spun away from it, meanwhile whirling her blade in a sweeping parry that, though executed blindly, knocked away the taloned hand of the conjured being that had sought to attack her from behind. Perhaps she'd startled it or stung its fingers, for it faltered. She feinted a head cut to addle it still further, then drove her blade into its chest.

The creature dropped. Pulling her weapon free, she peered about and saw that the two remaining ettercaps had succeeded in placing themselves on opposite sides of her and were warily moving in. They thought that when she turned to defend herself from one, the other would be able to rend her or sink its venomous canines into her from behind.

Their tactics might well prevail, if she permitted them to close in on her, press her, and generally control the tempo of the exchange. To forestall that, she bellowed and sprinted at the one crouched between her and the wall.

Its crimson eyes goggling in surprise at her precipitous action, the ettercap nonetheless managed to throw up one of its long, wiry arms to fend off her blade, but she dipped her point beneath the block and plunged it into the brute's belly.

As she yanked the sword free, she heard the remaining ettercap charging up right behind her, and realized she didn't even have time to whirl around to face it. Reversing her weapon and gripping the hilt with both hands, she thrust it backward under her arm, ducking simultaneously.

Just as she'd hoped, the ettercap's raking hands, aimed high, lashed harmlessly over her head. Meanwhile, the long sword slammed into flesh.

She sidestepped clear, turned, raised her weapon for another stroke or parry, then saw it wasn't necessary. The ettercap she'd just stabbed was collapsing, and the other five were sprawled motionless on the ground.

Tazi felt a swell of exultation as intense as any she'd ever known. She hadn't been a fool to trust in her skills and prowess. She was finally her old self again.

But she knew she had no time to stand and revel in the knowledge. She dashed for the door.

A different sort of arachnid, black with brown stripes, leaped from one of the window stages, its bony-ridged legs extended like lances to stab its prey. Talbot leaped aside, and the sword spider crashed down beside him. He drove his blade into its thorax, and it shuddered, listed to one side, and fell.

As usual, while he'd been busy eliminating one threat, others were moving in on him. From the corner of his eye, he spotted a bravo skulking up on his flank. The tough was phenomenally ugly, as if, in punishment for some crime, he'd been magically transformed into something inhuman, and the spell to restore him had only barely done the job. Tal whirled to face him, and his King Imre wig picked that moment to slip down over his eyes.

Knowing that the ruffian would seize the instant of his blindness to attack, Tal parried by sheer instinct. His blade rang on that of his opponent's, blocking his cut to the flank. The wig fell down to the floor, and Tal hacked at his adversary's sword hand, half severing it. Keening, the ugly man dropped to his knees.

One of the round-bellied ettercaps charged Talbot, its thin arms with their long-fingered hands outstretched, only to plummet abruptly from sight when a trapdoor opened beneath its feet. An instant later, a flying chariot drawn by pink dragons dropped from on high, nearly braining a ruffian who had been in the process of aiming a crossbow at Tal. The startled bravo jumped, his finger pulled on the trigger, and the bolt flew wild.

Talbot grinned. Evidently, Lommy and his brother Otter, who generally operated the Wide Realms's array of mechanical tricks and effects, had made their way to the controls beneath the stage and in the hut above and were trying to use them to help Talbot. Other members of the troupe were striving to do the same by flinging missiles and abuse from the relative safety of the wings.

Uskevren warriors were still fighting doggedly here and there about the theater, and Brom was still keeping the masked wizard busy. Their duel stained the walls with flashes of colored light, even as it filled the air with cracklings, hissings, thrummings, waves of heat and cold, and foul odors.

Meanwhile, Tal was battling as well as he ever had in his life; Master Ferrick, his teacher, would have been proud. Yet he suspected that none of it, not his own skill nor the valor and ingenuity of his supporters, would matter in the end. The enemy's superior numbers would soon carry the day, for, strong as he was, even he couldn't keep fighting this furiously for much longer, with never an instant's respite to catch his breath. Already he was panting, and could feel fatigue building in his muscles.

If only he could bolt through the door at the rear of the stage! It looked to be his only hope of survival, and he wouldn't be abandoning his allies, because all his would-be slayers would pursue him. But those same enemies were pressing him so hard that it was impossible to break away.

Retreating before another ettercap's advance, he heard a rattling overhead, looked up, and saw a falling star. The tasloi operating the hoists and windlasses had doubtless dropped the piece of stage dressing in hopes of hitting one of his assailants, but unfortunately, his timing was off.

Tal tried to dodge, but was too slow. Though only made of painted plywood, the star still struck him square and hard and dashed him to the floor.

He tried to drag himself out from underneath it, but his limbs barely stirred. Through blurry eyes, he watched his foes, human and otherwise, rushing in at him, and understood in a murky way that he was stunned, helpless, and in consequence about to die.

Then a primal, indomitable other roared up from the depths of his mind. He flung the star off and leaped to his feet. The moon wasn't full, he wasn't sprouting fur or fangs, but for this one moment, the wolf had nonetheless emerged to preserve the life the two of them shared.

The nearest bravos quailed before his feral grimace, or perhaps the growl rumbling in his throat. The summoned creatures kept coming. Tal decapitated a green spider, gutted an ettercap, and stormed into the midst of his foes.

Somewhere deep inside himself, the rational, human Talbot cried out in protest, for in its berserk fury, the wolf was taking the wrong tack. If he rushed in among them, he might wreak havoc for a moment, but then his foes would assail him from all sides and overwhelm him. Alas, his bestial alter ego refused to heed him.

Talbot drove his long sword through the torso of a one-eyed tough armed with a battle-axe, killed a spider at the instant it shimmered from a translucent, ghostly condition into solidity, then, suddenly, he glimpsed another blade flashing alongside his own.

Startled, he glanced to see who his new ally was. Tazi, clad in a suit of dark leather he'd never seen her wear before, had darted out of nowhere to help him, and somehow, her unexpected appearance banished the wolf. He was himself once more.

His sister's sudden assault had likewise caught the enemy by surprise. Together with the wolfs devastating onslaught, it served to scatter them and drive them back.

It was the opportunity Talbot had been waiting for. "Come on!" he gasped, and he and Thazienne dashed for the exit at the back of the stage.

As the enemy lunged after them, a painted backdrop depicting a castle by the sea crashed down between the hunted and the hunters, delaying the latter for a precious moment. Tal heard his fellow players cheer.

The Uskevren's box had been reduced to a sad condition. Portions of the paneling and seats had been variously charred, shattered, warped, and covered in frost. Brom was sure he didn't look in any better shape. He was bruised, bloody, and blistered, and his good mocado doublet, purchased shortly after Lord Uskevren hired him and the first truly genteel article of clothing he'd ever owned, hung in tatters about his lanky frame.

Meanwhile, his masked opponent with the strange, pale eyes hovered unscathed in the air beyond the paling, looking exactly as he had at the start of their combat.

Sadly, Brom's situation was every bit as dire as it appeared. His adversary hadn't misspoken; he was the stronger wizard. Until now, Brom had managed to hold his own, but he knew he'd been lucky, and at this point, he'd expended most of his genuinely potent spells already. His rival's next assault was likely to finish him off.

Brom supposed he wouldn't have been human if he hadn't been tempted to turn tail. He imagined that if he fled the box, he'd probably survive, for after all, he wasn't the victim the other wizard actually wanted to kill. The masked man-dead man, if what he'd said before was true-had only engaged him for tactical reasons, to pin him down and keep him from magically preventing Master Talbot's murder.

But Brom vowed he wouldn't run. Lord Uskevren had trusted him to serve and defend his House, and he intended to do his duty.

He extracted a grubby cotton glove from his mantle, and then, although he hadn't dared to pay much attention to the fracas onstage since he started fighting himself, something about the situation below snagged his attention.

Mistress Thazienne had appeared to support her brother, and together, they flung his assailants back, turned, and fled for an exit. A backdrop smashed down behind them.

If only the masked wizard didn't realize they were escaping! But no. Perhaps he'd noticed where Brom was peering, or maybe it was simply the prompting of instinct, but in any case, he turned his head and looked, also.

"Well," he said to his fellow spellcaster, "it would appear that we don't need to continue our contest." He floated upward, seemingly intending to soar over the tiring house and intercept the Uskevren when they came out the other side.

Brom would have liked nothing better than to let the other mage depart. But he knew Talbot and Thazienne needed a longer lead on their most formidable enemy to have any real hope of survival, and so he chanted and snapped the glove as if he were cracking a whip.

A huge, white, ghostly hand appeared in front of the masked wizard, hurtled at him, and shoved him backward through the air. For a moment, the spellcaster floundered helplessly against its luminous palm, then used his power of flight to distance himself from it. That gave him the space and freedom of movement to shout a word of power and swing his staff in an arc. The knob at the end slammed into the product of Brom's magic, and the hand vanished in an explosion of magenta fire.

The masked man turned toward Brom. "That was pointless. The Uskevren cadets are dashing headlong into a trap. Even if you slew me, it wouldn't save them. But if you insist on fighting to the bitter end, so be it." Snatching a packet from one of his pockets, he began to conjure.

Brom frantically did the same. If he could finish first, somehow slip a bit of countermagic past his enemy's wards, and disrupt the enchantment that held him aloft, the pale-eyed man would plummet-

He didn't finish first. Purple and emerald fire leaped from the other wizard's staff and engulfed him. For an instant, Brom had the terrifying impression that his flesh was attenuating, deforming, flying apart into particles finer than dust, and then he knew nothing more.

Talbot and Tazi plunged through the exit onto the snowy ground behind the playhouse, where the bodies of several more ettercaps lay motionless. The Wide Realms possessed an enchantment that held inclement weather at bay, and now Tal gasped at the bitter chill in the night air.

He and his sister sprinted toward a holding area where the palfreys and carriages of folk currently inside the theater awaited their owners' pleasure. Evidently the hostlers understood that something was amiss inside the walls, for they gaped at the newcomers. Or perhaps they were actually gawking in horror at the spiders, ettercaps, and ruffians charging over the open ground behind them. For though Tal hadn't looked back to check, he was confident his pursuers had yet to abandon the chase.

"Run!" he shouted to the hostlers, coachmen, footmen, and other servants loitering about.

True, the bravos and conjured creatures weren't actually hunting these innocents, but that was no guarantee that the hostile force wouldn't attack them if they were still lingering when it arrived.

The attendants scattered. Talbot untied his brown gelding, scrambled onto its back, and Tazi leaped onto the snow-white mare Brom had ridden.

Now that Tal was actually astride a mount, he risked a glance back at the playhouse. Sure enough, here came several spiders and ettercaps scuttling after him, and one or two toughs as well. Meanwhile, a spark of purple fire rose above the tiring house like a star of evil omen. Tal assumed it was the masked wizard, likewise taking up the pursuit.

The young noble shivered, and then he and Tazi spurred their steeds. They galloped for Stormweather Towers and left their foes behind.