The Shattered Mask

Chapter 21

Shamur and Thamalon galloped through the streets at breakneck speed, never slowing. They veered around other riders, wagons, litters, and carriages. They scattered pedestrians, who shouted insults after them.

Shamur felt like cursing them in return, cursing them for idiots who ought to be home in bed, not cluttering up the avenues late on a snowy winter night, not impeding her progress when she was flying to her children's aid. The delight she often found in reckless escapades was entirely absent now, smothered by fear for Tamlin, Thazienne, and Talbot and an iron resolve not to fail them.

She wished she could think that Nuldrevyn had been mad, his tale, false, at least in certain respects, for there was a particular horror in the notion that the Uskevren's chief adversary was a dead man. But that comfort was denied her, for in fact, the Talendar lord hadn't seemed demented, merely distraught. Moreover, Thamalon manifestly credited the notion that Marance had returned, while Shamur herself had discovered in the course of her youthful adventures that the world could be a shadowy, haunted place, and the boundary between life and death more permeable than most people cared to imagine.

She tried her best to scowl her trepidation away. Mortal or wraith, judging from the way he always held back from the thick of the fighting, Marance was wary of his enemies' swords, and that ought to mean that she and Thamalon could cut him down and send him back to the netherworld.

Hooves thundering on the cobblestones, the stolen war-horses plunged out onto the broad thoroughfare that was Galorgar's Ride. From here, the Uskevren had a straight course north to the High Bridge, and Shamur prayed they would now make better time. She squinted against the icy wind now gusting directly in her face, straining for a first glimpse of the Klaroun Gate. Finally, after what seemed an eternity, the ornately carved arch emerged from the darkness ahead. A line of men, weapons in hand, stood across the opening.

Shamur knew the Talendar warriors wouldn't close up their end of the killing box prematurely, for then the children couldn't enter. Their present state of readiness could only mean that Tamlin, Thazienne, and Talbot were on the bridge, and that the other would-be assassins were closing in on them, if they hadn't done so already.

Though the guards were facing north, it would have been absurd even to hope that they wouldn't discern Thamalon and Shamur's approach, because, of course, the destriers' drumming hoof beats gave them away. The warriors turned and eyed the riders with an air of uncertainty. Shamur could virtually read their minds. They'd been ordered to hold the Old Owl's fledglings on the bridge, not to keep anyone off it. Still, the newcomers' frantic pace alarmed them, or else the guards reckoned they shouldn't allow anyone onto the span to witness their comrades committing murder. In any case, one of them waved a sword over his head, signaling the strangers to halt.

Thamalon had happened upon a rack of lances on the way to the Talendar stables and appropriated one for himself. He couched the weapon now. Meanwhile, Shamur drew her broadsword, and, recognizing the riders as a genuine threat, the warriors hastily readied themselves to receive a charge.

With his longer weapon and his steed a length ahead of Shamur's, Thamalon drew first blood. The lance punched through the torso of the warrior in the middle of the line. Thamalon dropped the now-immobilized spear and rode on. Other warriors lunged from either side, and he caught a sword cut on his battered buckler.

Shamur lost track of him after that, because her mount crashed into the line, and she had her own fighting to think about. She split the skull of the foe on her right, then cut at the man on her left. But across the body was the more difficult stroke for a rider, and the warrior managed to skip back out of range.

Shamur tried to push clear of the guardsmen. Had she succeeded, she could either have sped on up the bridge or turned and attacked anew with the momentum of a full charge to her advantage, but her horse suddenly balked. Something had evidently hurt or spooked the animal, but she had no time to wonder what, for now the surviving warriors were driving in from all sides.

Pivoting back and forth, Shamur slashed madly about with the broadsword. The destrier bit and kicked. One by one, the Talendar warriors dropped or reeled back with bloody wounds, until Thamalon, long sword in hand, rode back into the fray and dispatched the last pair of footmen from behind.

The Uskevren wheeled their mounts and galloped on up the High Bridge, past homes, shops, and a guardhouse where, according to Nuldrevyn, the sentries lay magically slain or at any rate incapacitated. Shamur peered into the gloom until she caught sight of the next contingent of men-at-arms, and then she felt a pang of relief, because the enemy warriors had not yet skulked all the way up to the tavern called the Drum and Mirror. The actual attack had yet to begin, and therefore, the children must still be alive.

Some of the warriors had evidently heard the hoof beats, cries, and clangor of blades arising behind them, because they were looking back in the couple's direction. Not giving them time to organize a defense, the riders charged them. A javelin streaked past Shamur and clattered down on the cobblestones behind her. Then she was in the midst of the foe, and, leaning out of the saddle, whipped her blade in a cut that tore open a warrior's throat.

She galloped on, dealing with any enemy who lunged or blundered into her path, but seeking one particular target. Assuming that Nuldrevyn had accurately described the trap, there should be a spellcaster here on the south side of the tavern, either Master Moon himself or a Talendar retainer, and said wizard posed a greater threat than any one of the men-at-arms. She wanted to eliminate him before he could do any damage.

Finally she spotted the mage. To her disappointment, it wasn't Marance but a tubby little man with a bald pate and luxuriant side-whiskers, clad in a checkered mantle. It was, in fact, Dumas Vandell, a jolly, down-to-earth fellow with a limitless supply of jokes, riddles, and humorous poems and ditties. Over the years, Shamur had chatted with him at many a social function, and rather liked him. Now, in the heat of battle, she couldn't afford to regard him as anything but an enemy, and judging by the alacrity with which, upon catching sight of her, he began to weave a spell, he was indeed resolved to kill her if he could.

She wrenched her destrier's head around and charged, hoping to reach the wizard before he completed his incantation. She didn't make it. A shadowy bolt of force, so indistinct against the night that she would never have noticed if not for the sparkling motes and whining sound, leaped from Master VandelPs fingertips. She swayed to the side, and the magic crackled harmlessly past her.

An instant later, she closed with the wizard. He threw up his plump white hands to fend off her sword, but her cut smashed through his defense and gashed his hairless scalp. He collapsed, and, perched on her stamping, chuffing war-horse, she watched him until she was convinced he was unconscious, then rode on. For a second, she rather hoped she hadn't killed him, and then, when another guardsman tossed a javelin at her, she forgot all about him.

She had to cut down two more warriors before she reached the entrance to the Drum and Mirror, and by that time her children were wandering out the door to see what all the commotion was about. Tamlin, exquisitely dressed as ever, although for some reason, he had an ordinary axe, a tool, not a proper weapon, slung across his back, as well as a pewter goblet of wine in his hand. Talbot looked unkempt as usual. Thazienne, eyes bright with curiosity and excitement was clad in a suit of dark, close-fitting leather.

Shamur had rarely been so glad to see anyone, and judging from the way the children's faces lit up when she careened out of the gloom, they felt much the same. Now, however, was scarcely the time for sentiment.

As Thamalon galloped up behind her, she shouted, "Mount up! Hurry! You're in a trap!"

Feeling eager and slightly melancholy at the same time, Marance strode through the fish market, an open space equipped with tables and stalls. With him marched a band of Talendar men-at-arms and Bileworm, cloaked in the flesh of Ossian. In another minute or so, Thamalon's get would be dead, and then, the wizard supposed, his soul could at last enjoy a measure of peace. But what a shame that he'd had to kill his own nephew to accomplish his purpose, and in so doing, forfeit his brother's good opinion.

Perhaps one day, after the Uskevren were extinct and in consequence, the House of Talendar had grown more wealthy than ever before, Nuldrevyn would understand and forgive. In any case, Marance resolved that he wouldn't dwell on the matter, lest he cheat himself of his enjoyment of the slaughter to come.

Shouts, hoof-beats, and the ringing of blades sounded from the darkness ahead, jarring him from his reverie. He and his companions faltered in their advance.

"Those idiots attacked before us," Bileworm said.

"No," Marance replied. He pointed to a three-story cedar building still some distance ahead on the east side of the bridge. "That's the Drum and Mirror, and no one's fighting there yet. Someone has attacked our men."

"Should we run and help our lads?" asked one of Nul-drevyn's sergeants.

The warrior had actually been addressing Bileworm, or, as he imagined, Ossian, but it was Marance who answered. "Not yet."

After positioning his men and disposing of the Scepters in their guardhouses, Marance had elected to wait at the north end of the bridge, where it was absolutely impossible that the Uskevren would catch sight of him. Then, as midnight approached, he had created a magical implement that would enable him to see when his prey rode onto the span, and subsequently to survey the battlefield at need.

Though no one could see it, that small, spherical tool was floating above him now, following him about like a faithful dog. He focused his thoughts on it, and, abruptly, he was gazing down at his henchmen and himself, peering through the invisible orb instead of the eyes in his skull.

He sent the magical eye speeding along the bridge until he caught sight of the riders who had engaged his men. So far, it appeared there were only two attackers, but, mounted on destriers and fighting superbly, they were wreaking havoc even so.

As one of the newcomers cut down Master Vandell, Marance sent the eye winging closer, then twitched in amazement. Though the riders had made some small effort to disguise themselves, he recognized them, but how was it possible?

Bileworm sensed his master's stupefaction. "What is it?" he asked. "What do you see?"

"Thamalon and Shamur," Marance replied. He heard the quaver in his voice, felt himself shaking, and struggled to calm himself. "They evidently survived the demolition of the ruined fortress."

"How?" the spirit asked.

"I don't know," Marance replied, transferring his power of sight back into the eyes he had been born with, "anymore than I comprehend how they knew to come here to rescue their offspring. But it scarcely matters, does it? What does is killing the lot of them together." He gestured to one of the warriors, a burly fellow with a black mustache and a red scarf knotted around his brow. "Run to the north end of the bridge and bring up the rest of the men. Everyone else, attack."

The guards trotted forward. Marance turned to Bile-worm. "You, too."

The familiar arched an eyebrow. "Me?"

"Yes. The soldiers may fight better with one of their patrons in the thick of the fray."

"Master, I'd really rather not."

"Don't be such a coward. Even wearing a corporeal body, you're all but invulnerable to any real harm."

"Still…"

Rage flared up inside Marance, and his body clenched with the effort to contain it, though he knew it wasn't truly his impudent servant who had so roused his ire, but rather these maddening Uskevren who had somehow frustrated his attempts to slay them time after time after tune.

"You're my slave, and you will obey me," he snapped. "Go."

Bileworm sighed, drew Ossian's golden-hilted long sword, and scurried forward. He glanced back once or twice in the hope that his master would relent, but by that time Marance was already weaving magic, a candle held high in one hand and his staff in the other. Magenta sparks danced on the black, polished wood, and the cold air reeked of myrrh.

As Tamlin, Talbot, and Thazienne swung themselves onto their horses-destriers, Shamur noted approvingly, not palfreys, her children hadn't ridden out into the night completely unprepared for trouble-warriors in mufti came trotting down from the north. More of Marance's henchmen, joining the battle as expected.

Drawing her long sword, Tazi grinned at the approaching force. "Let's charge them," she said.

The wild, reckless part of Shamur's nature cried out in assent, but the portion that had loved and protected these children since their births demurred. "Not a wise idea," she said. "The guards will be receiving conjured reinforcements any second."

"All the more reason to punch through them now," Tazi said, "get within sword range of the masked wizard, and-"

"Your mother's right," Thamalon rapped. "We're getting the three of you out of here. Ride for home." Thazienne sneered, but when he turned his mount south, she, like her brothers and Shamur, did the same.

For a moment, as Shamur urged her war-horse into motion, she dared to hope they might escape without further difficulty, for the warriors behind them wouldn't be able to keep up with their mounts, and except for one or two survivors of the skirmish just concluded, the southern half of the bridge lay open before them. Then patches of soft violet light shimmered and swelled on the cobblestones ahead, and she realized that she and her family had run out of time.

"I suppose now we have to charge," Tamlin drawled. Even with enemies hurrying to engage him, he'd clung to his wine cup as he climbed into the saddle, and now he took a final sip, tossed the goblet away to clink on the pavement, and readied his sword.

"Insightful as usual," mocked Talbot. "No wonder you're the heir." Ahead, the purple lights died, leaving in their place a number of long, low, crouching shapes.

"Enough chatter!" Thamalon said. "Concentrate on the task at hand. Charge on my word, and… go!"

The Uskevren hurtled forward. One of the conjured creatures, ophidian but for the several short legs on either side of its scaly body, pointed its snout at Shamur.

She judged that she was still out of the beast's striking distance, but instinct warned her that it was about to attack her somehow, and she yanked on the reins and swerved her destrier to the side. A dazzling, crackling thunderbolt leapt from the reptile's head.

Shamur would have sworn that the flare of power missed her cleanly, but for an instant, her muscles clenched in agony. Evidently similarly afflicted, the war-horse stumbled, then balked. She kicked the steed, forcing it on at the behir, whose species she had belatedly recognized once the creature employed its extraordinary means of offense.

White radiance flickered and rattled on either side as other behirs assailed the rest of Shamur's family. The air reeked of ozone. The noblewoman's mount carried her into striking distance, and, unable to discharge a second lightning bolt just yet, the reptile that had attacked her reared up, its neck craning to place its head on a level with her own. Its crocodilian jaws gaped wide enough to snatch her from the saddle and swallow her whole. She thrust the point of her broadsword into the behir's neck, and, blood spurting from the wound, it fell.

A second behir scuttled into her path, running amazingly fast on its stunted legs. She disposed of that one with a cut to the skull, and then a pair of gnolls-hyena-faced warriors a head taller than a tall man-stalked out of the darkness, their poleaxes at the ready. Her eyes widened in surprise, for she'd been so intent on killing the behirs that she hadn't even noticed a second wave of Marance's agents materializing.

She rode toward the closer of the gnolls. When it thrust its weapon at her horse, she knocked the spiked head of the poleaxe out of line with her broadsword, then dispatched the shaggy warrior with a rib-shattering chest cut.

Even as the gnoll fell, its compatriot rushed in and swung its poleaxe in a chop at Shamur's head. She barely managed to lift her sword in time for a high parry, and the impact jolted her entire body.

The problem with a weapon as long and heavy as a poleaxe, however, was that even a fighter as big and strong as a gnoll needed a moment to heave it back into a position for a second attack when an initial effort failed, and Shamur intended to exploit that. She grabbed hold of the poleaxe just beneath the wickedly curved blade.

Snarling, the gnoll yanked on the shaft of the weapon. Brawny as it was. it doubtless thought it could free the poleaxe from her grip with little trouble, and in fact, she shared its confidence. But she hadn't intended to immobilize the implement for long, just long enough to flummox the gnoll while she leaned out of the saddle and drove her point into its breast. The brute's pulling actually facilitated the action.

The gnoll dropped, and Shamur looked about. For the first time since the conjured creatures had begun appearing, she wasn't facing an immediate threat. She could spare a moment to look and see how her companions were faring.

For one ghastly moment, she felt a pang of fear, for she only saw three horses besides her own plunging and wheeling about the bridge. Then she discerned that although one steed had been lost, its rider had not. Tazi now sat behind Talbot on the latter's huge paint destrier, wielding her long sword to lethal effect despite the impediment of the broad-shouldered youth immediately in front of her. So far, except for superficial cuts and bruises, everyone in the family appeared to be all right.

Grinning, Shamur turned her horse toward the next foe blocking the path to safety.

Peering through the invisible eye, Marance watched the battle with growing incredulity.

His summoned creatures scurried among the corpses, human and otherwise, littering the cobbles. Nuldrevyn's troops, a pack of ill-trained dolts no braver than Avos the Fisher's hooligans, advanced warily from the north. Bileworm's leadership notwithstanding, they had yet to charge in among the wizard's more exotic agents. The astonished residents of the houses on either side of the roadway, roused from their beds by the clamor of combat, gawked from doorways and windows. At the center of the tumult, the Uskevren cut their way toward the south bank of the Elzimmer.

A fair-minded man, even with regard to his estimation of his most hated enemies, Marance would have freely conceded that each of the Uskevren was a formidable combatant in his or her own right. Now he saw that the five of them fighting in concert were little short of awe-inspiring. One foe after another fell beneath their bloody swords, until the wizard recognized that, impossible as it seemed, if he didn't undertake measures to hinder them, Thamalon and his family were likely to get away. Marance had better decide on his tactics forthwith.

He would cast the rest of his ordinary summoning spells, of course, but he couldn't assume that additional conjured servants would fare any better than those already sprawled and lifeless in the Uskevren family's wake. The same long, relatively narrow structure of the bridge that had made it seem a fine site for a trap likewise made it impossible for too many opponents to come at the riders simultaneously, and thus he couldn't count on overwhelming them with sheer numbers. Something extra was required.

Should Marance dive into the thick of the fray himself, throwing blasts of fire and the like? The memory of Tha-malon's long sword ripping open his belly three decades before flashed unbidden into his mind, and his mouth tightened. Not that he was afraid, of course, for his death at the Owl's hands had been a fluke. He was confident of his ability to handle any man at close quarters. Still, it was foolish to fight in that manner unnecessarily. A spell-caster gave up much of his natural advantage when he allowed his foes into striking range, or, to some degree, even permitted them to lay eyes on him.

Of course, Marance could armor himself against ordinary arrows and the like, then fly above the Uskevren well out of reach of their blades, but even that might not be prudent. He had no idea what Thamalon and Shamur had been up to since he'd seen them last. He didn't know what sort of surprises they might have prepared for him, or what manner of puissant allies, wizards and priests, belike, might even now be speeding hard on their heels to the bridge.

No, all in all, it seemed best to destroy the Uskevren from a genuinely safe distance. Marance would do it with one of the great spells he carried in his memory, and never mind the drain on his vitality. After this encounter, he shouldn't need it any longer.

Should he then conjure the corrupt earth elemental? Perhaps not. Perched so high over empty air and running water, he might find it difficult to evoke and control the giant. Besides, somehow, Thamalon and Shamur had foiled the creature once already.

Smiling slightly, Marance decided another option was superior. Unless the Uskevren got off the High Bridge quickly, an improbability with the wizard's minions attacking them, the magic would inevitably kill them, yet, the true beauty of the scheme was that if he knew Thamalon, his old enemy might well stop even trying to depart.

Swinging his staff in intricate passes, the wizard turned widdershins and chanted in a rasping, grinding tongue never devised for a human throat. A knowledgeable observer might have recognized certain similarities to a spell employed by mortal wizards to invest themselves with the capacity to move objects by thought alone. But Marance's version, a secret he'd wrested from an ancient baatezu adept in Maladomini, the Circle of Ruins, was vastly more powerful. It could shift masses unthinkable for any earthly wizard.

The sky flickered red for a moment, and voices wailed and groaned from the empty air. Marance's body burned with purple flame as the power flowered inside him, and he stumbled with the glorious agony of the sensation.

The fire faded, or rather, withdrew inside him. In control of himself once more, he poised his hand above one of the fishmonger's cleaver-scarred tables. A toy-sized simulacrum of the High Bridge, made of violet phosphorescence, wavered into being between his fingers and the butcher-block beneath. After a second, he sensed that his creation had become palpable enough to touch, whereupon he took hold of it and began to shake it back and forth.

The bridge lurched, and Shamur's destrier staggered. Tamlin's mount lost its balance altogether, and the elegant young man, rather less elegant now that his lovely clothes were torn and soiled with the blood of his enemies, frantically kicked his feet out of the stirrups and flung himself clear to keep his leg from being smashed between the horse's flank and the roadway.

A second jolt followed hard upon the first. Shamur's terrified mount stumbled again. Realizing the impossibility of riding under these conditions, she scrambled out of the saddle and released the animal to look after itself. Talbot and Thazienne did the same. Thamalon, however, had to slay one of the remaining gnolls, magically compelled to attack even when it could hardly keep its feet, before he could dismount. Somehow he managed to control his panicky, staggering horse and wield his long sword at the same time, parrying a thrust of the gnoll's spear, then dispatching it with a chest cut. That accomplished, he jumped down onto the pavement.

Keeping a wary eye out for their foes, the five Uskevren blundered toward one another to confer. The shaking bridge rumbled beneath their feet. Houses on either side of the roadway swayed, their timbers moaning, and falling objects crashing inside them. A roof tore loose from its moorings, pitched backward, and plummeted toward the river far below.

"Quake!" declared Tamlin, raising his voice to make himself heard above the din.

"No," Shamur replied, "Our enemy's sorcery is shaking the bridge. Evidently he's willing to destroy the whole thing to kill us. I assume that either he's stepped off the north end already, or he has a magical way of getting off at the moment of collapse." She looked at the road before her, where cobblestones jarred loose from their bed and jutted like rotten teeth, and saw that she and her family had covered a good portion of the distance to the Klaroun Gate. "I think that if we keep moving, we have a fighting chance of getting off ourselves. However-"

Two more gnolls lumbered forward. Conversation ceased for a moment while the Uskevren cut the creatures down.

"You were about to observe," Thamalon panted, "that if we simply run away, everyone who lives on the bridge will die."

"Yes," Shamur said. Frightened and unaware of what was truly happening, most of the residents wouldn't even try to get off the span. Thinking to wait the strange rumbling out, they'd simply cower in their homes.

"Then we need to kill the masked wizard and hope that ends the shaking," said Thazienne impatiently. "Fine. That's what I wanted to do in the first place, but does anyone listen to me?"

Strands of sweaty black hair plastered to his face, his square jaw set, and a feral light in his eyes, Talbot nodded. "Let's have done with the wretch. Avenge Jander and Master Selwick here and now."

"And put an end to all this unpleasantness so we can go back to living like civilized people," said Tamlin, brushing futilely at a gory spatter on his sleeve.

"Come on, then," Shamur said. She and her family began to advance back the way they'd come, when the shaking stopped. For a moment, she wondered if her analysis of the situation had been at fault. Perhaps the High Bridge wouldn't break, perhaps the spell that threatened it had run out of power. Then spheres of purple glow swelled in the gloom ahead, and as soon as they birthed the creatures intended to block the way, the span resumed jarring back and forth. Evidently Marance was unable to rock it and conjure more of his minions at the same time, and so had elected to briefly suspend the one action in order to accomplish the other.

When Shamur approached close enough to see them clearly, she judged that the wizard's new servants had been selected specifically to operate on this precarious ground, for they all possessed more than two legs and a low center of gravity. One of them, a pallid creature somewhat resembling a centipede, its segmented body half again as long as a man was tall, scuttled toward her. Tentacles coiled and writhed between its round, black eyes.

From past experience, Shamur knew that a sticky secretion on a carrion crawler's flexible arms could paralyze at a touch. The tentacles whipped at her, she swept her broadsword in a parry, and the bridge jerked. She fell, her attempt at defense turned into a useless flailing, and one of the feelers brushed her wrist.

For an instant, a horrible numbness flowed up her arm, but then the sensation passed. Praise Mask for her sturdy gauntlet and sleeve, which had kept most of the crawler's greasy, malodorous poison from reaching her skin.

Though it might not matter in the long run. She was sprawled on the ground, and the insect-thing was still scuttling forward, chittering. She rolled across the heaving roadway with the carrion crawler in mad pursuit, and then, when she thought she'd widened the distance between them sufficiently to buy herself a moment, tried to scramble onto her feet.

Just at that instant, another tremor jolted her, but, fighting for balance, she refused to let it tumble her back down. She faked a dodge to the right, then darted left instead. Only deceived for a moment, the carrion crawler lashed its tentacles at her. A couple of them only missed by inches, but miss they did, and then she was behind the creature's head with its leathery natural armor and positioned to strike at its softer, more vulnerable flank.

She drove her point deep into the crawler's body, between the base of the head and the first pair of legs. The beast jerked spasmodically, then went down.

As she pulled her blade from the carcass, Shamur surveyed the battlefield. Thamalon was plunging his blade into the chest of what must surely be the last surviving gnoll. Talbot and Thazienne fought side by side against a trio of carrion crawlers. Tamlin, who had lost his sword, slammed the axe into the spine of an enormous, fire-breathing canine. The hell hound fell, and the youth crowed in delight.

"I told you this thing was lucky," he called to his embattled siblings, brandishing the gory tool as he spoke. Tazi sneered.

Shamur scowled in frustration. There were plenty of carrion crawlers and hell hounds still remaining, and the bubbles of violet and magenta light swelling on the roadway ahead promised even more adversaries. Meanwhile, the Uskevren had only succeeded in making their way a short distance north.

They were never going to cut through all of Marance's defenders in time to prevent the destruction of the bridge. They needed another solution, and perhaps, Shamur thought, smiling at the audacity of the notion that suddenly occurred to her, that meant it was time to stop behaving as if she were a mere earthbound warrior and start acting like the thief in the red-striped mask.

If she meant to try her idea, it had to be now, before she attracted the attention of another opponent. Leaving Thamalon and the children to keep Marance's minions occupied, praying they'd manage all right without her, she dashed to the facade of one of the swaying houses. Then, struggling to cling to hand- and footholds that constantly threatened to judder free of her grip, she climbed.

For a man as orderly and intelligent as Marance, it was child's play to juggle the various elements of a complex task. He shook the bridge for a while, glanced through the magical eye to see how the Uskevren were faring, summoned some new opponents for them if it seemed necessary, and then repeated the sequence. Now seated on the table beside his magical simulacrum, he didn't even have to worry about the tremors knocking him down.

Nor need he fret over what would happen when the bridge collapsed beneath him. A single magic word would cause him to drift downward toward the surface of the river as slowly as a bit of silkweed fluff. Then, while his leisurely descent was in progress, he could either invest himself with the power of flight or, if, as he expected to be, he was absolutely certain that all five Uskevren were dead, he could simply click his iron thumb rings together and return to the netherworld. Perhaps the latter option was preferable, given that he'd pretty much worn out his welcome at Old High Hall.

If Bileworm was in the immediate vicinity, the magic of the rings would whisk him to the Pit as well, but Marance doubted the familiar would make his way back to the fish market in time. He supposed he might actually miss the scamp, his companion and confidant for nearly thirty years. But one must accept casualties in war, and, happily, the Nine Hells possessed an abundance of slaves.

A shout roused Marance from his musings. Turning his head, he saw that the strapping warrior with the red kerchief on his head had finally returned with the men-at-arms Marance had dispatched him to fetch. Three of them, anyway. The others had no doubt been too prudent to set foot on the quaking bridge.

"What are you doing?" the big man demanded, swaying as the vibrations rattled him.

"Nothing," said Marance, deeming the lie worth trying. "Go forward and help Master Ossian."

"Do you think we're stupid?" the guardsman replied. "We see that thing under your hand. You're shaking the bridge, and I know damn well that Lord Talendar wouldn't want you to do that. Stop it right now, or we'll stop you." He brandished his long sword.

"If you insist," Marance said. He took his hand away from the simulacrum, but naturally, the tremors in the actual bridge continued. It would take time for them to subside, if, indeed, that was still possible, if he hadn't already damaged the structure sufficiently that a collapse was inevitable.

"I told you to stop it!" the warrior barked.

"I understand," Marance said. "Evidently it's going to take a bit of countermagic."

He removed a scrap of fur, a piece of amber, and a paper of silver pins from one of his pockets, and then, manipulating the spell components, he began to chant.

When he was half way through the incantation, the men-at-arms somehow guessed what he was really up to, and frantically staggered toward him. But they failed to close the distance in time. A flare of lightning crackled from Marance's hand to the warrior with the scarf and blasted him dead.

Immediately the magic leaped from the importunate fellow's withered, blackened corpse to the guard behind him, then leaped twice more, slaying each man in his turn. Surveying the smoking, reeking husks, Marance sighed. "I regret that was necessary," he told them, then took hold of the bridge simulacrum once more.

Shamur waited for the present shock to subside, then leaped across the narrow gap between rooftops. Had she not chosen her moment properly, a fresh tremor might have staggered her and spoiled the jump. Even though the bridge wasn't shaking too badly, the houses still were. The vibration made her lead foot slip as it landed, and she fell and slid down the pitch. Grabbing for some semblance of a handhold, she managed to arrest her descent before it could fling her off the eaves into space. As she proceeded on her way, she reflected that if the shaking had made walking the roadway difficult, traveling the thief's path above verged on the impossible, even for a pupil of Errendar Spillwine.

Nor could she proceed cautiously. Unless she scrambled as rapidly as possible, risking a fall with every move she made, she stood no chance of finding Marance in time to prevent the destruction of the bridge.

At least her scheme was sound. The wizard hadn't thought to station any of his creatures up here, which meant that if she didn't plummet to her death, she could get at him without having to hack her way through dozens of defenders.

Off to the east, where the black river met the bay, she spied the myriad lights of the floating city. Had it only been last night that she'd bounded from vessel to vessel in pursuit of the tattooed ruffian? So much had happened since that it felt like a lifetime. She wondered fleetingly if the watermen could hear the tortured bridge grinding and rumbling, if they all were peering up at it, and then the section of shuddering roof she was currently climbing shed its shingles all at once.

The slates streamed down the pitch like an avalanche. She had nothing at all to cling to, and as the skidding, disintegrating shingles carried her relentlessly down toward the drop off, she could only scramble frantically, striving to reach something solid to grab onto before she plunged into space.

She seized hold of a piece of sturdy eaves just outside the slippage even as the loose shingles swept her lower body off the edge. She grunted at the jolt as her arms took her weight. The bridge lurched, and she gripped with all her strength to keep the shock from jarring her loose from her handholds. Then she hauled herself back up onto the roof.

Afterward, she would have liked nothing better than to lie still and catch her breath, but knew she had no time for such an indulgence. She forced herself to continue onward.

In a few more seconds, she peered down at the roadway. For the most part, Marance's minions were behind her now, but she still saw no sign of the wizard himself. She wondered grimly just how much farther she had to go.

Bileworm skulked through the shadows on Ossian's feet, the dead youth's beautiful sword in his hand. Or at least he tried. It was difficult to move stealthily when he could barely maintain his balance.

He was on his own now. As soon as the mock earthquake – perhaps he should call it a bridgequake – had begun, the Talendar troops under his nominal command lost all interest in combat. They only wanted to hunker down and wait out the tremors. Trust Master to initiate one strategy, then abruptly switch to another that entirely undermined the first one, and left the lieutenant charged with making the alpha plan work stuck in a precarious position.

Still, though Bileworm was now alone, Master had commanded him to fight, and fight he would, for he was far more afraid of the wizard's displeasure than the Uskevren.

His best course, he reckoned, was to pick out one enemy who had drifted away from the others, strike him down by surprise, slice off a recognizable trophy, and carry it back to Master. Surely then the spellcaster would concede that his servant had done his duty, and allow him to spend the rest of the battle idling safely at his side.

Bileworm spied Thamalon himself, finishing off a hell hound. The nobleman was at least ten paces from Talbot, his nearest ally, who was busy with adversaries of his own.

Placing his left hand over his breast, Bileworm glided forward.

Ironically, it was one of the tremors that saved the Owl, for by staggering him, it turned him around sufficiently to see the would-be assassin slinking toward him. He and Bileworm both came on guard, the familiar making sure to stand in extreme profile, angling the left side of his body well away from the human's blade.

''I know what you really are," Thamalon growled. "Nuldrevyn explained it."

"How nice for you," Bileworm said, then lunged.

Ossian had been a competent swordsman, and by inhabiting his corpse, Bileworm had inherited a measure of his skill. Still, employing his buckler, Thamalon deflected the attack with ease, then riposted with a head cut.

The nobleman's long sword sheared away the left side of Bileworm's face. The shock of such a grievous injury would have incapacitated any normal fighter. Bileworm, however, had no need to suffer discomforts arising in Ossian's flesh. He reflexively blocked the pain and renewed his attack.

The remise caught Thamalon by surprise, but, displaying the reflexes of a highly trained combatant, he twisted aside from Bileworm's point with not an inch to spare. Instantly he hacked at the spirit's extended wrist, slicing muscle and tendon and splintering bone. The blow didn't quite lop off Bileworm's hand, but it rendered it useless for swordplay.

Time to go, then. Hoping that Thamalon wouldn't see him depart in the darkness, Bileworm stumbled around, turning his back to the aristocrat, then exploded from Ossian's mouth. The lad's corpse collapsed.

His malleable form flattened against the cobbles, Bileworm slithered rapidly along, seeking another shell to inhabit. The first he came across was a behir carcass, and after a split second's hesitation, he passed it by. If a body wasn't manlike, it sometimes took him a few minutes to figure out how to make it move properly, and he needed a vessel in which he could fight immediately.

Next, he spied a dead gnoll with a gash in the side of its furry neck and its hide tunic tacky with blood. That ought to do. He poured himself between the creature's fangs, then jammed his substance into rough alignment with the gnoll's limbs. Rushing the possession this way, he might find that his new body moved a trifle awkwardly, but the violence of the bridge bouncing about reduced everyone to clumsiness anyway.

Bileworm stealthily turned the gnoll's hyena head. Thamalon was still poised over Ossian's mangled form as if suspicious that it was about to jump up and resume the battle. The familiar took hold of the gnoll's notched iron scimitar, leaped to his feet, and charged, once again hoping to take his opponent by surprise.

Alas, Thamalon sensed him rushing in on his flank, spun in his direction, ducked low, and extended his point at the gnoll's chest. Staggering as another tremor jolted him, Bileworm only barely managed to halt in time to avoid impaling himself, an injury that, though it might not have affected him at all, might also have inconvenienced him severely. Snarling, he hastily reverted to the fighting stance he'd employed before.

Struggling for balance as the bridge shuddered, the two combatants circled, until Bileworm discerned an apparent weakness in Thamalon's guard. He swept the scimitar in a brutal arc toward the outside of the human's sword arm.

Thamalon's blade instantly shifted back to the right, closing the line. Metal rang as the scimitar struck the long sword and rebounded. The nobleman cut at the gnoll's already damaged neck and severed its head.

Since the head couldn't fight, Bileworm elected to remain with the body. He plunged forward, slashing madly, hoping that sheer ferocity would compensate for the fact that he was now fighting blind.

His curved blade touched only air, and his leg gave way. Thamalon must have cut it out from under him.

As the gnoll fell, Bileworm streamed up from the stump between its shoulders. This time, Thamalon saw him leave, and thrust his point harmlessly through the familiar's shadowy form. Bileworm gave him a mocking leer, then darted away, shrinking himself so his foe would lose track of him.

Tottering, Thamalon pivoted this way and that, peering to see which of the corpses on the cobblestones would rear up and attack him next. Meanwhile, Bileworm circled, trying to decide the same thing. Which carcass would best serve his purpose?

After a few seconds, he noticed the dead Talendar guard slumped in a shadowy, recessed doorway at Thamalon's back. It was in the one direction that Thamalon hadn't glanced. Evidently he hadn't noticed it was there.

Swinging wide to keep the Owl from spotting him, Bile-worm slithered up to the warrior's body and writhed his way inside. When the dead man's eyes began to serve him, he discerned that everything was proceeding according to plan. Thamalon still had his back to him.

Bileworm gripped the warrior's longsword and carefully climbed to his feet. He was resolved that this time, he would keep silent and succeed in attacking by surprise.

He assumed his fighting stance, crept forward, and aimed his sword to pierce Thamalon's spine. Then, just as he was about to thrust, his enemy spun around, lunged, and drove his point through the guard's heart and deep into Bileworm's form beneath.

Wracked by a shock and weakness he couldn't block out, Bileworm dropped his blade. Swaying, he told himself that this couldn't be happening. He, who had survived for millennia by dint of his cunning, couldn't perish at the hands of a dull-witted mortal man. Yet even as he denied it, he knew it was true.

"You aren't quite as clever as you think," Thamalon told him almost gently. "I pretended to ignore one of the corpses to induce you to occupy it, so I'd know from what quarter you'd attack next. And by taking such pains to protect your heart, you simply revealed where you were vulnerable."

The human sounded so smug that Bileworm felt some sort of mocking retort was in order, but with his mind crumbling, he couldn't think of one. His knees buckled. and darkness swallowed him.

Across the roadway, a four-story post-and-bearn house rumbled, swayed, and collapsed. Shamur winced to think of the unfortunate family crushed or trapped inside, and then, at last, she caught sight of her quarry.

As she'd hoped, Marance was alone, in the center of the fish market. She realized that she'd unconsciously expected to find the masked wizard standing straight and tall to work his magic, his hands upraised and his dark mantle flapping around him. Instead, he'd seated himself atop one of the fishmonger's tables, where he was rocking a glowing violet miniature replica of the bridge back and forth.

The burnt black remains of four men who had apparently tried to interfere with Marance lay within a few paces of the butcher-block. A few pale, horrified faces gawked from the windows of houses adjacent to the market, but evidently none of these spectators could muster the courage to try to stop the spellcaster, even though they must realize that if he kept on as he was, his efforts were likely to kill them.

Shamur, of course, did intend to stop him, and this once, despite her natural inclinations, she had no intention of allowing her adversary a sporting chance, the better to challenge and revel in her own prowess. Marance was too formidable, and there was too much at stake, to opt for a fair fight as long as she had an alternative. If possible, she meant to slip up on him from behind and dispatch him before he even realized he was in danger.

Unfortunately, the fish market was one of the few sections of the bridge that didn't have buildings along the sides. It would have been easier to sneak around behind Marance if she didn't have to descend to ground level, but she reckoned that a skilled thief still should have a chance. It was night, after all, and she was wearing dark clothing, including a hooded cloak to distort her silhouette. She started to clamber down the brown-stone wall of the last house south of the open space.

When she was halfway to ground, a tremor hit, and her poor, abused fingers, battered, wrenched, and rubbed raw by all the difficult climbing she'd already done, finally failed her. She lost her grip and fell.

She thought fleetingly that Marance was going to get his chance after all, for he would surely notice her slamming down on the cobbles. Then she did precisely that. She tumbled into a forward roll to cushion the shock, but it was a hard landing even so, and knocked the wind out of her.

Though half stunned, she felt a pressure in the air around her, and when she looked up at Marance, she observed that the glowing simulacrum of the bridge was reshaping itself into a doll-sized image of herself. Knowing a magic that could shake tons of stone could surely crush her to jelly in an instant, she hastily scrambled several feet to her left. The feeling of pressure vanished, and her replica dissolved into a shapeless, shifting blob of purple light, from which she inferred that this particular spell couldn't seize hold of her as long as she kept moving. Good to know, though it still left her with all of Marance's other tricks to worry about.

She drew her broadsword and stalked toward him, noticing as she did that even though he'd stopped tampering with it, the bridge kept on shaking. That probably meant it wouldn't take much more abuse to make it fall; she only prayed it wasn't doomed to collapse regardless. Staff in hand, Marance rose and glided backward from the writhing ball of purple phosphorescence, maintaining the distance between himself and his adversary, interposing butcher-blocks between them.

"This is rather a pity," the wizard said. "If I have to fight one of you Uskevren face to face, by rights, it ought to be my principal enemy, Thamalon."

"I disagree," Shamur said. "You murdered my grand-niece and made me into your pawn, so I deserve the satisfaction of killing you. I've been hoping for a chance to confront you when you weren't surrounded with a horde of protectors."

"Then you're in luck," he replied, "for I've pretty much expended all my summoning spells already. But I really don't think I'll need them to dispose of you."

He reached inside his voluminous mantle. She sprang up onto a heaving table and charged him, bounding from one butcher-block to the next. He couldn't use them to impede her advance if she was running on top of them.

Still retreating, he brought out a feather, an article which she, who had known her share of wizards, recognized as one element of a spell of flight. She had to prevent him from casting it, or he'd soar up beyond her reach and magically smite her at his leisure. Reciting a rhyme, he twirled the quill through a complex mystical pass, and magenta sparks danced along its length. Meanwhile, still running, she transferred the broadsword to her left hand, drew her dagger with her right, and threw it.

She was grimly certain the quaking would hamper her aim, and in fact, the cast missed. But the knife flew close enough to his Man in the Moon mask to make him flinch, and the feather slipped from his grasp, disrupting the spell in progress.

Not allowing him time to attempt any other magic, she plunged into the distance and cut at his head, a hard, direct attack which, given that most spellcasters she'd known were not exceptionally skilled at hand-to-hand combat, she fully expected to land. But with the facility of a master, Marance slapped the broadsword aside with his staff. The two weapons were only in contact for an instant, but purple fire sizzled from the wooden one into Shamur's blade.

Wracked with pain, shuddering uncontrollably, she saw her opponent spin the staff to deliver another blow. Unable to parry, dodge, or counterattack in her current state, she floundered desperately backward and fell off the back of the table.

Once again, she crashed down with bruising force, but almost felt that the impact jarred some of the spasticity out of her, for her seizure abated somewhat. When, his staff weeping magenta flame, Marance scrambled around the table, she lurched to her knees and met him with a thrust to the groin. Since he halted abruptly, the attack didn't harm him, but it bought her a second to regain her feet. Then it was her turn to retreat and retreat while her twitching subsided.

Abruptly, catching her by surprise, Marance stepped backward as well, putting space between them, snatched something out of his mantle, and murmured another incantation. Voices moaned and gibbered from the air, and shadows danced crazily.

With terrible suddenness, bands of shimmering violet light appeared all around Shamur, thickening, meshing, rapidly combining to form a closed sphere. She lunged at one curved side of the trap and ripped at it, feeling the surface harden from a gummy consistency to steely hardness just as she forced her way through.

By that time, Marance was already completing another spell. A flare of dark power leaped from his pointed index finger. Shamur threw herself flat, and the magic sizzled over her. Even though it missed, for an instant, it made her jerk with agony.

She decided she couldn't allow him any more free shots at her while she was out of distance. Sooner or later, she wouldn't be able to dodge. She scuttled behind a butcher-block, then darted in his approximate direction from one such piece of cover to the next, scrambling on all fours, never presenting a target for more than an instant.

As she advanced, she heard him chanting in some bizarre tongue that was all grunts and consonants, but as far as she could tell, the spell had no effect. No destructive power blazed in her direction, nor did her surroundings alter.

Finally she was close enough to rush in and attack him. Somehow divining her location, he pivoted in her direction, settled into a fighting stance, and lifted the sparking, smoldering staff into a strong guard.

She nearly hesitated, for she was sure that last spell had achieved something, had set some sort of snare for her. But she couldn't very well retreat and permit him to strike her down from behind, then resume demolishing the bridge. She had no choice but to fight him, and so she bellowed and charged, trusting to her skills and aggression to see her through whatever surprise he had devised.

When she was nearly close enough to attack, her eyes met the strange, pale ones shining inside the sockets of the sickle-shaped mask, and Marance spoke a word of power. At that instant, Shamur's eyelids dropped, and her knees buckled, even as her mind grew dull and somnolent. She barely noticed Marance sweeping the staff around in a horizontal strike, and nearly failed to comprehend the significance as she did.

Nearly, but not quite. She dropped beneath the blow and bit down savagely on her lower lip. The burst of pain helped clear her mind of the unnatural sleep that had threatened to overwhelm her.

As she sprang up and came back on guard, she realized that Marance's last spell had given him a capacity somewhat like the basilisk that nightly guarded Argent Hall. He could now induce unconsciousness with his gaze, which meant it was perilous even to glance at his pearly eyes. In fact, she thought with a sudden, unexpected swell of her old daredevil's exultation, given all the wizard's advantages, this would almost certainly be the most challenging duel of her career.

Grinning, she feinted a thrust at Marance's foot, then, when the staff whipped down to club her wrist, she lifted the broadsword to cut his forearm. Retreating a half step, he spun his length of polished wood in a parry, and she snatched her blade back a split second before the two weapons could clash together.

He swung the staff at her head, and she jumped back out of range. At that point, he too tried to retreat, and she sprang forward to keep him from withdrawing too far away. She had to press him hard at all times, never allowing him a single moment's respite to cast a spell.

As they battled on, the crackling staff leaped at Shamur time after time, burning brighter and brighter, its corona of magenta fire burning streaks of afterimage across her sight. She ducked when the weapon shot at her head, jumped over it when it swept toward her ankles, sidestepped blows, or evaded them by hopping backward out of range, sometimes avoiding calamity with less than an inch to spare. Whenever Marance gave her a chance, she struck at him in turn, relying on compound attacks to draw the staff out of line and counterattacks to catch him at the moment he started to swing or thrust at her. She made sure above all else that whether her action succeeded or not, he wouldn't be able to bring his weapon into contact with her own.

Considering the handicaps she was laboring under, her mere survival demonstrated that she was fencing as brilliantly as she ever had in her life. But even so, she couldn't penetrate his guard, and soon, she would begin to slow down, for no one could fight as furiously, as she was, never pausing for an instant to catch her breath, without flagging fairly quickly. Meanwhile, if Marance felt any fatigue, he wasn't showing it, and she feared that such mortal limitations were meaningless to the dead.

If she didn't find a way to kill him quickly, he was going to do the same to her, and she could only think of one tactic that might serve.

Marance twirled the burning, crackling staff in a move calculated to draw Shamur's eyes to his face. He'd attempted the trick before, and, recognizing it for what it was, she'd refused to fall prey to it. Now, however, she intentionally did what he wanted her to do, praying that, having resisted the magical slumber once, she could do so a second time.

Marance spoke the magic word, and gray oblivion surged into her mind. Suddenly, everything was dull, distant, meaningless, and, her body numb and leaden. She simply wanted to collapse onto the cobbles and sleep.

Then some defiant part of her remembered Thamalon and the children, dependent on her to save their lives, and, biting her lip bloody, she thrust the lethargy away.

The magic had staggered her, and, pretending she was still in its grip, she continued to reel, meanwhile watching Marance through slit eyes. When he stepped in to bash her head with the staff, she lunged so deeply it carried her beneath the arc of the blow and buried the broadsword in his chest.

Now it was the wizard's turn to stumble, dropping the staff as he blundered backward. The sizzling sparks blinked out as the rod clattered on the cobbles. Shaking, he struggled to lift his fair, delicate hands, seemingly to bring his iron thumb rings together.

Shamur had no idea what that would accomplish, but, suspecting she wouldn't like it very much, she yanked her weapon from his torso, flicked off the thumb of his right hand, then cut at his head. The broadsword shattered the crescent mask and crunched deep into the skull beneath.

Marance collapsed. Believing that one couldn't be too careful with the undead, Shamur, panting, watched him for a time to make sure she really had destroyed him, and while she was so engaged, she noticed that at some point during the duel, the bridge had stopped shaking.

Apparently it wasn't going to fall.