Traitor to the Blood

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Wynn flattened against the wall next to Hedi in the small alcove at the head of the north-side corridor. Fortune favored them more than Wynn hoped, as they met no one along the way, even when sneaking off the main stairs and through the keep's wide entryway. They kept to the side of the staircase and inched along the rear wall down the north corridor, all the way to the corner.

"Take that scarf off your head, Hedi whispered. Crouch down and peek around the corner. I saw guards by the end door the other day, and they appeared less than attentive."

Wynn sank to her knees, still holding the candlestick and bag, and kept her head near the floor as she looked. Two guards stood before a door, apparently talking, but the corridor was so long that she could not catch what was being said. She pulled back and stood up.

"They will see us the instant we step out," she whispered.

Hedi gave her a hard glare as she handed Wynn the key taken from the young guard.

"Then we will let them," Hedi returned. "Follow me like any attentive servant. When the moment comes, be ready with that candlestick. If you still want your freedom and your life."

Before Wynn could reply, Hedi tucked both hands behind her back, still holding the dagger, and stepped into the corridor.

Wynn's breath caught in her throat and her thoughts froze upon the only plan Hedi could have in mind. It was too dangerous, but Wynn could not stand there alone in the corridor. She tucked the candlestick behind Korey's bag and followed.

Hedi stepped smoothly down the corridor, and Wynn could not help but duck her head. She glanced up every few steps, until Hedi halted just out or arm's reach of the guards.

i he one to the right appeared the most tired, with the half-closed eyes of someone too long on duty. Tall and lanky, he wore a leather hauberk that was at least clean and well made. The other on the left was an overweight, bristly-jawed soldier who smelled of ale even before he spoke.

"Lady?" he said. "Did you lose your way?"

Wynn saw only Hedi's back and the dagger behind it. Hedi turned her head toward the fat soldier, and the tall one became nervously alert. He straightened to attention with a worried side glance to his partner, who swallowed hard and cleared his throat.

"Lady," he repeated. "No one goes below without us being told to allow it. And there's nothing down there anyway."

Hedi lunged at the heavyset guard.

Wynn dropped the bag, and a muffled yowl came from within as it hit the floor. She glanced down, remembering Korey was inside. When she raised her eyes again, everything happened too quickly.

The bristly-jawed soldier toppled toward the corner with a strangled yelp. Hedi followed so close that she leaned into his chest. Her hands were tucked between herself and the soldier. His eyes filled with shock-then pain. Sharp whimpers escaped through his gritted teeth, and he clawed at something between himself and Hedi.

The lanky tall guard took a fast step toward Hedi's exposed back, reaching for his shortsword.

Wynn cocked back the candlestick with both hands. He turned toward her as she swung. For an instant the candlestick's wide base arched straight for his head.

It passed before his face, never touching him.

Wynn's good eye widened. The pain in her swollen one brought a sinking realization. Panic and hampered vision made her misjudge the swing.

In one movement the lanky soldier jerked out his shortsword and swung hard with his free hand. Wynn did nor see the fist that caught the blind side of her head.

Magiere stepped back from the stout door to let Leesil study it further. Emel had already shoved the twisting wall section back into place. She glanced at it repeatedly, half expecting it to grate open again with gray-clad Anmaglahk lunging out, stilettos in hand. Foolish, since Byrd had to get back inside the city before he could even contact them. She tried to shake the feeling off.

"I do not recognize this place," Emel said.

Leesil didn't look up. "Most who see its inside don't live long enough to return for another look."

"I meant I have been in the lower levels but not here," Emel growled back.

Magiere studied the door once more. There was no lock, only a peep slot with its metal panel closed from the outside. The door would swing outward, and so the hinges weren't accessible either.

"Shouldn't the keep's occupants have easy access back inside if needed?" she asked.

"Yes," Leesil answered, then sighed. "I'm missing something here."

He was frustrated, and Magiere wished she could help, but she didn't have his experience and skills. Even Chap could sniff about the room, checking every corner and crevice. All she could do was wait, and keep Emel from breaking Leesil's concentration.

Chap rumbled and traipsed over to Leesil's side. Two low woofs said he had found nothing worthwhile.

Leesil dropped to his knees and fingered the doorframe's stones. He finally sat back on his haunches, clenching his fists. When he reached around behind his own back, Magiere crouched to help him pull the toolbox from its makeshift harness.

"There has to be a proper way through this door," he said, opening the box. "But we've no time."

Magiere still didn't care for the sight of the silvery garrote lying therein amid his spare stilettos and a thick curved blade. She heard a muffled curse from behind her. Emel had seen the box's contents as well. She looked over her shoulder at his feet rather than into his eyes, making certain he kept his distance.

"If I can't open it from within," Leesil continued, "then I'll have to reach out somehow."

He took out the thick, curved blade and folded the box closed. Magiere returned the toolbox to its harness as Leesil stood up. He set the blade's point against the door above its handle and gripped the hilt with one hand over the other.

"Time to call attention to ourselves," he muttered.

Emel stepped close-too close for Magiere's taste.

"You are not serious?" he asked. "You will never cut an opening with that thing."

"Better hope otherwise," Leesil answered, and threw all his weight behind the knife.

He pulled the blade sideways toward the frame. The blade scored into the wood, and it made more noise than Magiere liked as it tore through the grain. Leesil cut a line slightly longer than the width of his hand. He repeated this several times, deepening the cut with each stroke, then moved up to work another cut a hand's length above the first one. Finally he used the blade's tip to chip and peel the woods top layer with the grain, digging out a rectangle between the two cuts. The process was difficult and noisy, and Leesil's brow began to sweat.

Magiere understood what he was up to and took the blade to relieve him. She worked inward until she'd gouged halfway through the door.

"Enough," Leesil said, and took the blade from her.

This time he worked at the top and bottom cuts without chipping more wood from the hollow they'd created. He finally stopped, tucked the hooked blade in his belt, and drew one of his winged blades. He set its tip into the hollow's center.

"If that didn't attract attention," he said, "then there's no one out there to hear this."

He slammed his weight behind the blade's crosswise handle.

The crack of wood made Magiere flinch as Leesil's punching blade sank in sharply. He jerked it back out, and Magiere leaned down to look into the hollow.

The wood had broken away on the outside, leaving a rectangular hole. Leesil crouched and slipped his arm through the hole and nearly up to his shoulder. Magiere heard scraping metal, followed by a click.

Leesil pushed the door open but stood there with a scowl, not stepping out.

"What's wrong?" Magiere asked.

"Nothing… just another obstacle I've removed for Byrd's Anmaglahk."

"No other choice," she said, and stepped past him.

The cell they exited was one among a row along a double-wide passage. They had been trapped in the last one at the back end. What passed for a lock was a metal slide bar with a pin, just enough to keep a prisoner inside but not requiring a key to the door. The place was silent, but Magiere still opened two of the other cells. Both were empty, and the door handles were thickly grimed by dust and damp air. This place had been left unattended and unused for a long while.

Leesil closed the cell door behind them and sheathed his winged blade. He did his best to press the popped chunk of wood back in place. It didn't stay, and Magiere grimaced as he licked the piece's rough side and smeared grime from the floor on it. He pressed it in again, and it held. No one would notice at a quick glance, unless they opened the door and the piece fell out.

Leesil walked ten paces to the far-end door with a larger barred window. The outer room beyond was dimly lit.

"Locked?" Magiere whispered, growing anxious.

Leesil gently pulled on the latch. The door opened, and Chap slipped by them into the next room, sniffing about with his nose in the air.

"Who taught you… your skills?" Emel asked.

By his tone Magiere suspected he already guessed the answer.

"Does it matter?" Leesil returned.

Magiere glanced back at the baron. Emel watched Leesil carefully, but his gaze shifted to her.

Leesil stepped into the outer room and stopped. Magiere saw him roll a shoulder as if fighting a brief spasm of muscle.

"My parents taught me," he finally answered. "Shutter the lanterns and leave them inside the door. We'll want our hands free."

Magiere did as he asked and followed him into the long room.

Crates, barrels, and other goods were piled end to end with narrow paths and small spaces between. The far wall held another door, and more closed portals were along the back wall to the right. The long wall to her left was a series of stone pillars forming archways, and beyond these she saw a parallel passage running north and south. Two braziers in that passage's far wall threw dim light through the arches into the storage area. Magiere stepped through the center arch and looked both ways down the passage.

Both far ends met with stone staircases leading upward, one to the north and the other south. In the center of the passage's wall was a door she hadn't spotted while standing within the storage area. Its dark wood was bound with polished leather strips and iron straps, all mounted with steel studs. The handle and mounting plate were steel as well and didn't show the same signs of age as the brazier mounts. Unlike the slide-bolted cell doors, it had a keyhole. A few paces along the wall to either side were outlines in the stonewall where two more openings had been filled in and closed up.

"Why isn't anyone down here?" Magiere asked as she rejoined Leesil in the storage area. "The cells were empty, so where would Darmouth keep Wynn?"

"There are no prisoners," Emel said. "Except for your friend and my Hedi. Darmouth beheads traitors immediately. Petty criminals and captives are killed unless they swear fealty. Our forces grow thin, and every able body is pressed into service. His paranoia mounts by the year, and no one stays within the keep unless he has a hold on them. Anyone who does is kept under watch, though there are few men to spare for that."

"Then where is Wynn?" Magiere insisted.

"I am not certain," Emel said. "Hedi is not officially a prisoner, so she would be given a room above. It is possible your Wynn is up there as well, awaiting questioning or-"

"You let us think she was locked down here." Leesil turned on Emel. "Why didn't you tell us this back at Byrd's?"

"I did not know if you would still assist me!" Emel snarled back, but a flicker of guilt passed across his features. "I must get Hedi back, and I needed your help. I used you no more than you have me… but I will find your companion."

A chill ran through Magiere, as if she'd just crawled from the winter lake. She was sick of this land. Amid all the lies, truth was held concealed like a weapon to be used in the right moment. Anger swelled, and though she tried to quell it, her words were spiteful.

"Are you so cowed that your wits have festered? We can't search above without being seen!"

"I can," Emel answered, though he looked less than certain. "Few in the keep will know I have not been summoned. And fewer still would question a trusted noble in Darmouth's confidence."

"You'll just come up out of the prison?" Leesil asked. "Look around you. The braziers are lit, but there's dust everywhere. Few ever come here, and not without permission."

Emel fell quiet, as if he hadn't considered this.

Magiere bit back any further viciousness before she spoke. "We'll search this level first. No one goes up until I'm certain Wynn isn't down here somewhere. Maybe we can find another route that…"

She stopped as Leesil spun away. Losing himself in the middle of something this dangerous wasn't like him. He was coldly quick and calculating when necessary, but little he'd done since they'd come to Venjetz was like the Leesil she knew. He stood there with his back turned, and she reached for him.

"Emel, if you know so much of Darmouth," Leesil blurted out, "what do you know of my parents?"

Magiere stopped before she touched him.

Everything these two said to each other was laced with poorly hidden accusations. Leesil didn't like speaking to Emel, much less asking anything of the man. Emel turned his gaze toward the ornate door beyond the archways.

"I knew of them," he said with hesitation. "I saw Lady Nein'a at a few of Darmouth's gatherings. She was often… in the company of some noble or officer."

Magiere stiffened. Emel's implication brought a low rumble of displeasure from Chap. She wondered if the dog had known of Nein'a's "duties," and she looked back to Leesil. Again, she wanted to touch him, to stop him from asking anything more that might shake what little hold he had on himself.

"The tunnel," Leesil said. "It has to be why they ran for the keep. Do you know if they escaped?"

"I do not," Emel answered quietly. "I oversaw western fiefs at the time and did not return to Venjetz until your parents were gone. By then, Paris and Ventina already hovered in Darmouth's shadow. Questions concerning Lady Nein'a and her husband were treated as impudence. No one inquired further."

Magiere slowly came up behind Leesil and laid her hand upon his back. It took a moment to speak, but she needed his help… needed him to put his questions aside for the moment.

"Start looking," she said, and felt his back swell with a slow breath.

Leesil pulled away from Magiere's touch without looking at her. There was no time for her to soften his pain. She pointed to the ornate door beyond the arches.

"Where does that door lead?"

Emel hesitated. "Darmouth's family crypt. He holds private counsels there sometimes… with certain individuals. It is locked, but no one would ever be held there."

Magiere nodded. She took one of the three doors in the long back wall. Leesil took another, and Emel the last. She found only empty cells and an abandoned room at her passage's end. She returned to the storage area as Leesil came out of his passage and shut its door.

"Some stores tucked in the cells," he said coldly. "Nothing more. The keep is being stocked up more than is normally needed."

She hurt for him every time he spoke.

Emel returned with a concerned frown. "Weapons, bundles of quarrels, and a rack of arbalests."

"Maybe Darmouth prepares for a siege," Leesil said.

Emel's silence was confirmation enough; he'd not known before now. It seemed Darmouth kept even his closest nobles in the dark, not that they couldn't see the turmoil of the province for themselves. And so much the worse if its leader suddenly died.

Magiere went to the door in the storage area's far end. The room hadn't seen use in some time. There was a wooden chair and a table with old quills scattered upon it. A tapestry hung from an iron rod across most of the back wall, so faded and worn. She couldn't make out anything of its image other than the oak leaf pattern along its tattered border. She stepped back out.

"Some kind of office," she said. "No one has used it in a long while. So now what?"

Emel shook his head. "It is time I bluffed my way onto the main level. We will try the south staircase. I believe Martin and Kerev are on night duty there, sometimes Devid, but they all know me. I can claim to be inspecting stores in lower levels. "

"Except they never saw you come down here in the first place," Leesil said pointedly.

"If asked, I will say I went down the north staircase," Emel explained. "None will be the wiser, as they will not run into the guards from that position until off duty at sunrise."

"And what about us?" Magiere asked, as she didn't care to leave Wynn's fate in Emel's hands. "We just wait here?"

"For now. Stay below the landing within hearing… in case my ruse fails."

Magiere followed Emel with Chap at her side, though she glanced back to be sure Leesil was there. His expression was as cold and emotionless as the first day they entered Venjetz.

They made their way up the south staircase, which was longer than Magiere had expected. The lower levels were deep, "when they reached a landing before a door, Magiere stayed back with Leesil and Chap some five or six steps down the stairs. Emel reached for the latch, and a frantic female voice rang out on the other side.

"Devid! Are you there?"

"He's at the bridge gatehouse tonight," answered a deep male voice. "Something you need, Julia?"

Emel froze as the woman's voice grew louder and nearer the door's other side.

"Oh, Martin," she said. "Lady Progae and Korey are missing. So is the woman locked up in the north side. Ventina found young Mikhail out cold in the woman's room, and now Faris is in a fit. He sent word to our lord and Lieutenant Omasta that the keeps been breached and then he went off on his own. He blames Devid, and I came to warn him."

The woman's words came out in a rush. Little made sense to Magiere except for the mention of a prisoner. It had to be Wynn. The voices continued, but Magiere waved Emel back down the stairs.

"We go back down," she whispered. "If Hedi and Wynn are missing at the same time, they may be together. Hedi's note said she'd try for the lower level. We need to be ready, in case they're followed."

"There's no time," Leesil said softly. "If Faris thinks the keep has been breached, that means…"

Leesil paused so long Magiere became anxious. They couldn't stand about in the stairwell, waiting to be found. He glared down the stairs.

"Byrd," he whispered.

"What of him?" Emel asked.

Magiere followed Leesil's gaze and saw nothing, but realization followed quickly. She knew what occurred to Leesil. Her voice rose almost too loud.

"That two-faced fat rat used us!"

Byrd had slipped away once they'd discovered the tunnel, but it hadn't been long enough for him to take advantage of his new information. Unless the elves had followed them from the city.

Magiere remembered the strange flashes of light she'd glimpsed as they'd left Venjetz-signals in the dark. And now they'd let the Anmaglahk in. She didn't see how the elves could pass through without notice, but it wasn't the first time one had managed such a feat, Sgaile, the one who'd come to Bela, had entered the barracks of sages without even Leesil realizing until it was too late.

"Emel, there are assassins in the keep," Leesil whispered. "Elves."

The baron paled as he too looked down the stairwell.

"Byrd has planned this for a long time," Leesil added. "I thought I could leave a warning and be gone before they made a try for the keep. But if they're already inside… The guards are too busy searching for escaped prisoners to stop assassins, even if they could."

"We cannot let this happen," Emel insisted. "No one would mourn Darmouth's death, but the raids across our borders are growing. Now he has begun stocking the keep for a siege. If the nobles and officers go into a frenzy, fighting to take his place, the province will be overrun from outside."

Leesil took a stiletto from his wrist sheath. "I know."

Magiere gripped the hilt of the falchion, squeezing it tightly until her hand ached. She hated feeling responsible for the people here. And worse was risking Leesil's life to save the man who'd maimed him in so many ways.

"Get those guards to open that door," she told Emel. "Don't bother bluffing your way through."

Chane had never been inside the keep. Straight ahead was a wide stairway leading up. To either side of its base were passages running north and south, and in the entryway's side walls were arched openings into wide chambers.

And where exactly was he to find Wynn in this place? There were too many options, and Welstiel would not be far behind once he dealt with their escort.

Chane approached the stairs. Voices came from a distance, and he stopped. Someone was in the corridor above on the next level. Two men, one louder than the other and angry. He could not tell if they were headed for the stairs. He slipped around the base of the stairs and into the small alcove at the head of the north corridor. He crouched low against the wall as he opened his senses wide.

A pained whimper and crack came up the corridor behind him.

He glanced up at the stairs, then retreated down the corridor. When he reached a sharp turn in the passage, he paused to spy around the corner with one eye.

At the far end, a woman in a gown was backed against the side wall by a tall soldier. He held a shortsword pointed at her chest, and she stood rigid with a bloodied dagger in her hand. A second fat and unshaven soldier was crumpled in the corner beyond them. The man breathed in quick whimpers while clutching his stomach, and blood seeped between his fingers. None of them looked Chane's way.

Someone else lay on the floor. A woman in a plain muslin dress rolled to her side. Light brown hair toppled from her face, exposing a reddened cheek and jaw below an eye swollen half-shut. A brass candlestick lay just beyond her open hand.

Chane's senses sharpened at the sight of Wynn's beaten face.

There was blood between her lips, and it ran in a thin line of saliva out the corner of her mouth.

He rounded the corner at a run.

Every fragment of life energy he'd stolen welled through his cold flesh. When the tall soldier and the woman heard his footfalls and turned, he'd already closed the distance.

The lanky soldier raised his sword.

Chane grabbed the mans throat with one hand. With the other he snatched the soldier's grip on the sword, closing his fingers over the man's own. Chane squeezed tightly as he drove the soldier to the floor.

He barely heard the muffled pop of cracking bone. He kept squeezing, tighter and tighter, with the image of Wynn's battered face wedged in his mind until it was all he could see. It clouded the guard's reddening, silent face… gaping mouth… swelling tongue.

"Ch… ch…"

Chane froze at the sound of her voice trying to say his name. The soldier's eyes were wide and blank. Blood ran between Chane's fingers, and he felt the split skin of the soldier's throat beneath them.

"Wynn?" he rasped, and turned his head.

She lay with her face toward him, one eye half-open. It closed slowly.

Chane scurried to her on all fours. He reached to grab her, saw his hands soaked red, and shrank back. He heard Wynn's even breaths, heard her heart beating evenly. She was alive, only slipping into unconsciousness, but he could not tell how badly she was hurt.

A scuffling behind him snapped his head around instinctively, and he lashed out with his boot. It connected with the fat soldier's throat. The mute crackle of the man's windpipe mixed with his choking, and he sagged in the corner, still and silent. Behind that sound Chane caught the soft pad of feet and swung back around.

Rage rose up in Chane on the tail of his fright. For an instant he saw Magiere waiting for him with dark hair and pale features. His muscles tightened.

Her skin was not quite pale enough.

The woman in the gown stiffened, halting her reach for a canvas bag between Wynn's feet. Something squirmed within the bag.

Memory surged in on Chane-a woman behind an inn.

He remembered the taste of her blood and fear… smelled that fear on her now, though there was little of it in her hard expression. This was the one who had been spying in the keep. Chane shifted on all fours, crouching protectively over Wynn.

The woman stepped slowly back, holding out the dagger.

Chane's thoughts began to clear. Wynn had been trying to get below this keep, and this pale woman was with her. He lowered his head like an animal suppressing its urge to spring, and locked his eyes upon the woman's own wary gaze. His voice rasped within the narrow passage.

"Do you still wish to live?"

Leesil gripped a stiletto and waited behind Magiere as Emel pounded on the door.

"Open up. It is Baron Emel Milea."

"Baron Milea?" a deep voice called, and after a brief jangle of keys, the door opened.

Leesil saw a perplexed soldier standing in the opening with a hauberk of large leather scale. He stared at Emel and then turned his eyes upon Leesil in the stairway below.

Magiere shoved past Emel and drove her fist into the soldier's face. The man teetered backward, and a second soldier leaned in from beyond the door to grab the tail of her hair.

Chap rushed in, sinking his teeth into the second man's inner thigh. Before the guard cried out, Emel smashed the man's face with a fist and shoved his way through the door. The second guard's grip held on Magiere's hair, and she toppled out of Leesil's sight.

Leesil rushed out and found himself face-to-face with a stunned housemaid with reddish hair tucked under her cap and an empty serving tray clutched in one hand. Her shock turned to fright, and she swung the tray at him.

He ducked aside, and the tray caught Emel in the face. The baron toppled back through the stairwell door.

Leesil hissed under his breath. He, Magiere, and Chap should have taken these guards down in two breaths, and with far less racket. The only fortune was that neither guard had been able to draw a sword. From his crouch, he swerved around behind the maid. When she opened her mouth wide to shout, he had no choice and struck the back of her head with the butt of his stiletto. The tray clattered out of her grip to the floor, and he caught the maid under the arms and lowered her down.

Chap had one guard pinned. Magiere had pulled her hair free and now grappled with the other.

"Leesil, go!" she called to him. "Get to Darmouth. I'll find you."

Leaving her in this or all places wasn't something he'd ever imagined doing. But it was his only choice.

The corridor was open before him, and he ran cautiously in a half-crouch. He knew part of the main floor well enough, and there would be few places to hide. When he reached the end of the long south corridor and entered the alcove, he crawled forward to scan the wide entryway. There was no one about, and he hurried to the nearer archway. Flic meal hall was empty, and he ducked inside.

His thoughts drifted for an instant to what Emel had said.

He'd called his mother "Lady Nein'a," seen with nobles and officers here in this keep. Leesil had wondered in his youth why she was required at Darmouth's few evening events. Had his father known all along? Only a naive boy wouldn't have imagined…

"What-Lady Progae is gone? And what breach? Make sense!"

Lees saw no one in the entryway, but Darmouth's deep voice carried from inside the council hall across the way. His grip tightened on the stiletto.

For all the years since he'd heard that voice, it sank him into all the shadows of his past. He closed his eyes tight, then snapped them open again when memories leaped at him from the dark in his own mind.

He would do this. He would save Darmouth from the Anmaglahk.

"Where is Faris?" Darmouth boomed. "Where is that useless trash? Find him!"

As if to answer this question, Leesil heard the entryway's doors swing open. He glanced around the archway's side.

Faris entered, wild-eyed and half-mad with anger, and behind him was a woman who resembled him closely. She panted, looking panicked. The two hurried toward the council hall, and Leesil stayed low, still watching. Faris paused short of the archway, seeming to prepare himself to face Lord Darmouth.

A distant shout echoed from the south corridor, and Faris turned.

Leesil ducked back. If these two followed that sound… He looked back carefully.

Faris and Ventina were gone. Leesil heard running footsteps fade down the south corridor, headed straight for Magiere and Chap.

All Leesil's instincts screamed at him to go back to them.

"I want the mongrel Mondyalitko and his bitch found!

Darmouth's voice echoed across the entryway, and Leesil pulled back into hiding.

The only way Chap could silence his adversary was to rip the man's throat out, but he hesitated. Killing made the predator instincts of his animal body rise up. It was unsettling, and he needed to remain aware of all around him. The soldier he had pinned kept swearing and swinging, and Chap ducked and snapped at the man's face.

Emel appeared at Chap's side, and smashed the hilt of his straight saber down on the soldier's forehead. The man dropped unconscious, and Chap wheeled away toward Magiere.

He grew anxious the instant he saw her.

Her irises were black, and it seemed her nails had lengthened. The soldier she fought looked openly horrified. Magiere sank her fingernails into his hauberk and slung him sideways into the corridor wall. Before he could right himself, she rushed in. She punched him so hard in the face that his head slammed back into the stone wall. The shortsword toppled from his grip as he slumped down to the floor.

"Magiere?" Emel said, stepping toward her. "Are you all right?"

Chap advanced quickly as Emel looked into Magiere's face. The baron had seen her change at the lake while diving in the icy water. But here, up close, she was a disturbing sight to anyone who did not know what she was.

Magiere breathed hard, and Chap wished he had time to give her calming memories he had gathered from her thoughts over the years. He heard footsteps down the corridor and looked.

Faris appeared with Ventina on his heels.

"You?" Faris snapped at the sight of Magiere.

Chap growled. These two had expected to find someone else here. Faris eyed Emel, and his expression filled with contempt.

"I knew your head would end up on a spike," he said. "No one sincere can grovel that well. Where has your consort taken my daughter?"

Ventina stepped close behind Paris, and her voice cracked with hysteria. "Where is she, Emel?"

"I do not know," Emel answered. "I came for Hedi."

Faris shook his head slowly. Your lord and master will clear that foggy memory. Move toward the counsel hall!"

"I don't think so," Magiere said.

Chap sidestepped in front of Magiere, hearing her breath coming hard. She was fighting for self-control, and there was nothing he could do to help her. He kept his eyes on Darmouth's servants. Anyone unarmed who gave orders so easily made him wary.

The first ripple passed through Ventina's flesh.

Her face darkened as short brown-black hairs sprouted across it. She dropped to all fours. Hands and feet swelled, and fingers shortened into heavy paws with sharp claws. Her shoulders arched, filling out until her shirt and dress split. Faris writhed and changed beside her.

Chap heard Magiere's falchion slide from its sheath. He now faced two great predator cats taller than himself. They were black in color, but wherever the hallways brazier light touched them, their fur shimmered a deep brown. Their large eyes were the same hue as their fur, and the only way Chap could tell them apart was by Faris's one missing ear. For an instant, they stood like two sentinel statues blocking the passage, then Faris snarled, exposing yellow-white teeth and long fangs. A yowl of rage rolled out of his throat and reverberated off the stone walls. It struck Chap's ear like the combined roll of thunder and the crack of lightning splitting the air.

"Into the stairwell!" Emel shouted, backing up. "Get behind the door."

Ventina roared, and Chap whirled, trying to shove Magiere back. Magiere ran for the door. She shot through it, and Chap followed.

Emel tried to slam the door closed. It bucked against him before he finished, and Chap ducked aside as the baron pitched backward, nearly knocking Magiere down the stairs.

"Down! Down!" Emel yelled.

Magiere descended, taking the steps three at a time. As they rushed into the lower corridor, Chap ducked into an archway along the passage and whirled about, looking for Emel.

The baron ran down the corridor toward Chap, and then he pitched sharply forward to sprawl on the stone floor.

Faris crouched atop him. Out of the dark passage, Ventina leaped over her mate. Her front paws touched down, and she swerved through the first archway toward Magiere.

Chap let his canine nature take hold. He bared his teeth and lunged forward into Faris's snarling face.

Darmouth couldn't remember a night of so much stupidity. Even Omasta had failed him, and he was one of the few to whom Darmouth gave his full trust. The raid on Byrd's inn found the place empty. Now some lack-beard guard from the bridge burst in with a muddled message of escaped prisoners and a breach of the keep.

"What-Lady Progae is gone?" Darmouth shouted. "And what breach? Make sense!"

The young man cowered, lowering his eyes. "Faris came running out to see if we'd admitted or released anyone. I told him Devid brought in that count and his manservant, but they never came back out. When Devid came out, he rushed off into the city, saying that you'd sent for him.

"How, if I'm still here?" Darmouth asked, and his voice grew louder in frustration, "Where is Faris? Where is that useless trash? Find him!"

Omasta stepped to the hall's archway, looking out. "My lord, if the keep is breached, we must get you to safety."

"No-I want Andraso," Darmouth growled. "That outlander and his servant are the only breach here. Andraso must be working with the hunter, and Emel will answer for it. And Devid will be crows' food on the city wall!"

Darmouth pushed past Omasta toward the archway. A bestial roar and hiss echoed through the keep from the south corridor.

Omasta raised his arm in front of Darmouth. "My lord, please. If Faris… He wouldn't take such action inside the keep, in plain sight, without great need. We must get you to safety."

Omasta's concern did move Darmouth. It was the reason he'd never punished his lieutenant, even when the man faltered. And his bastard son's failures were rare. Omasta was sensible and skilled, like his sire.

"Take six more men oft" the keep walls," Darmouth said. "You'll need them."

"And you will let me secure you away?" Omasta insisted. "In time! Now call those guards."

When Westiel felt certain he was safe from discovery, he silently stepped down the stairway behind the counsel hall's tapestry. The wolfhounds followed.

At the bottom was an opening covered by a heavy cloth. He touched it, realized it was the backside of another tapestry, and let his senses reach beyond the fabric. He detected nothing living beyond and lifted the tapestry aside. The hounds trotted out ahead of him.

Welstiel stood in an empty room with a door in the far wail. I here was only an old wooden chair and a table strewn with broken quills. The tapestry was too faded and worn to make out anything but the oak-leaf pattern along its border. Then he heard snarls and cries, and the roar of a predator.

Welstiel reached the door and slid open its metal peephole shutter to look out. He tensed at the scream of a raging cat. It took two blinks to truly grasp what he saw.

Magiere rolled across a stone floor between stacked crates and barrels, tangled with an enormous brown-black cat. Lees was nowhere in sight, but to the right through a set of archways, Chap lunged into a second feline. The two animals tumbled off the back of Baron Milea.

Welstiel looked back to Magiere.

She snarled as savagely as the beast that grappled with her. One upper arm bled through claw tears in her wool sleeve beneath the hauberk. She had abandoned her sword and stabbed at the cat with a dagger. The cat thrashed so rapidly it countered every swing of her blade.

The baron regained his feet but looked unsteady.

Welstiel could lose Magiere here and now, but he could not allow himself to be seen. He looked about the room for anything he might use, and his gaze fell upon the wolfhounds.

They might not last, but they could give Magiere time and advantage.

Welstiel focused, calling upon the dogs' dormant predator nature. That latent ancestry lay suppressed beneath generations of domestication, but some spark of the beast buried within them was necessary for his effort to work.

He built an image of the great cats in his own mind. One hound bared its teeth with a growl, and the other quivered as it inched toward him.

Welstiel ducked behind the door as he pulled it open, and the hounds rushed through.

Hunger burned strength into Magiere, and instinct was all that kept her dodging Ventina's quick and fluid strikes. Each time Magiere lashed out with the dagger, Ventina's muscles shifted rapidly, and the cat aimed another slash of her claws.

Magiere heard Chap's snarls, but Paris yowled with equal rage from beyond the storage room's archways.

She twisted right on the floor, as Ventina slammed a large paw down toward her face, then whipped back and stabbed for the cat's throat. Her dagger sank into Ventina's shoulder, and the cat squalled in pain. Magiere rolled free, scrambling to her knees with the dagger poised. Ventina tried to lunge, but her foreleg wouldn't hold, and she stumbled.

Growls rang out behind Magiere, and she glanced toward the sound.

Two wolfhounds rushed between stacked crates, and despair crippled Magiere's rage. She heaved herself backward to her feet.

Emel was up again, and Magiere shouted, "Watch Chap's back!"

She steeled herself as the lead hound charged toward her. It barreled straight into Ventina, and the second dog leaped to the top of a wide crate. As Ventina roared and twisted about at her new attacker, the second hound leaped from the crate toward Paris.

Magiere hesitated in confusion.

Ventina's hindquarters became exposed when she turned on the hound, and Emel stepped in, straight saber gripped two-handed. He rammed the blade through her back.

Its point came out the bottom of her rib cage. She squalled and crumpled to thrash wildly upon the floor.

Magiere rushed out the nearest archway into the passage. Faris faced both Chap and the second wolfhound, but Magiere saw no way to join in the narrow space. Chap looked as feral as he had the day at the Stravinan border. He snapped like a wild animal.

The wolfhound had landed behind Faris, and the cat was boxed between the two dogs. It clamped its jaws on Faris's hind leg. As the cat twisted back to snap at the hound, Chap lunged in. His teeth closed on Faris's throat just below his jaw, and Chap thrashed his head wildly.

Blood spattered the wall and floor as Faris's throat tore away. Chap leaped to the side, the silver fur of his face stained red and dripping.

Faris's panicked yowl ended in strangled choking. He collapsed, squirming, with the wolfhound still tearing at his leg.

Magiere saw Faris's fur begin to recede.

His body writhed within his skin as if another form hid within it and struggled to emerge. Fur on his head grew to dark hair as his one ear slipped down the side of his elongating head. The more he changed, the feebler his movements became.

Faris's naked body lay dead before Magiere, with the torn muscle and sinew of his throat still leaking blood across the stone floor.

"Stop," Magiere shouted at the wolfhound.

Her voice sounded clear to her own ears, and her teeth had shifted halfway back to normal. With the change came returning fatigue and a burning ache in her left arm where she'd been clawed.

Someone coughed.

Magiere stepped through the archway toward the strangled weeping among the crates and barrels. Ventina had changed as well and lay naked with Emel's blade through her back. She tried to gasp air while tears ran down her face.

This wasn't what Magiere had wanted, and she knelt down at Ventina's side. These people were slaves just as Leesil had been. Emel knelt beside her, his expression troubled.

Ventina grabbed Magiere's forearm, glaring up with a strange mix of panic and lingering hate. "Korey…" she choked out, and her eyes shifted to Emel. "You know what he'll do to her."

Emel sagged with a slow sigh. "I will protect your daughter, as best I can."

Ventina's breathing slowed as she stared wide-eyed up at Emel. When her breath stopped altogether, her eyes remained open. Her grip was still tight on Magiere's arm, and Magiere went numb, peeling the dead fingers away.

"Are you badly hurt?" Emel asked.

"I'm all right." The slashes were bleeding but not deep, and she would heal quickly enough.

"Look away," he said. "I have to free my sword."

If he had any idea what horrors Magiere had witnessed in her life, he would never have said such a thing to her. Magiere found his strange chivalry curious. He jerked the blade free of Ventina's body with a sickening wet sound.

Something nudged Magiere's side. She looked around 10 Chap's blood-soaked face. The sight no longer bothered her as it once had, and she stood up.

"We have to find Leesil."

Chap barked once.

"Hide the bodies first," Emel said. "Even with the blood here, it's best their deaths are not discovered too soon."

For the first time Magiere could remember, a sweet coppery scent filled her head. Her gaze shifted to the red pool spreading around Ventina's corpse. The sight made the smell even sharper, but there was no time to ponder why this new awareness plagued her now.

Both wolfhounds had ceased growling and trotted back toward the far end of the storage area. Magiere ignored them and helped Emel drag Faris and Ventina through the last of the three doors at the room's back. She sheathed her dagger, picked up her falchion, and followed Chap to the south stairway with Emel close behind.

Welstiel put a hand to his face in quiet relief. Magiere's injuries were minimal. There was nothing more he could do at the moment to drive her from this place. He watched quietly until he was certain that she and her companions were gone, then slipped out to follow. He ignored the wolfhounds and crept up the south staircase.

The door at the top was closed, and he crouched upon the landing. With his senses fully open, he picked up voices as far away as the keep's wide entryway. This was as good a place as any to wait for opportunity. He had yet to drive Magiere from this land.