Word of traitors

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

28 Sypheros

In the afternoons at Khaar Mbar’ost, many of the warlords, councilors, and courtiers could be found walking and talking in the hall of honor. The hall occupied the full length of one of the fortress’s upper floors. Statues of dar heroes stood against the walls, and stained glass windows depicting scenes of famous battles dominated the distant ends. The air in the hall was generally soft with murmured conversation, though a few times Ashi had heard it ring with the sound of steel on steel as conversation erupted into argument and a brief duel.

Today it was quiet. The curse Ashi muttered under her breath as she entered seemed like the loudest exclamation in the big room.

There was no sign of Geth here, either. She looked back at Aruget, waiting beyond the door-in spite of Vounn’s insistence that the hobgoblin warrior accompany her everywhere, there were some places guards weren’t permitted-and said, “I’ll be back.”

Aruget’s ears pulled back just a little bit. Ashi had the distinct impression that he didn’t appreciate being dragged through Khaar Mbar’ost in her search for Geth, but Geth wasn’t with Tariic in the throne room today. He was finally alone. If she could find him, they’d finally be able to talk.

At the east end of the hall of honor, Munta the Gray leaned against the wall beside one of the tallwindows. The stained glass had been tilted open to allow a cool breeze into the room. More than half the sky was covered in heavy clouds, beautiful day slipping into threatening evening. The old warlord held a goblet and sipped from it frequently. Furs had been bundled around his shoulders, but he faced into the wind with a drawn look on his face. He turned as she came near and his pensiveness faded a little.

“Korluaat, Lady Ashi?” he asked her. He gestured and a goblin servant offered Ashi a goblet before she had a chance to answer. The beverage inside was strong enough to make her nose twitch at the alcoholic fumes. She’d been served it once or twice at feasts in Khaar Mbar’ost-the name of the stuff translated as “hero’s blood”-but it wasn’t a drink she enjoyed. She smiled and mimed sipping a little of it before asking, “Munta, have you seen-”

But Munta spoke before she could finish, gesturing expansively at the horizon beyond the window. “Dagii’s out there somewhere,” he said and Ashi could smell the korluaat rolling off of him. “Chasing down elves, maybe being chased down himself.” He took a swallow from his goblet. “Tariic assembles a new army, ready to fight. I’ve never seen Ghaal’dar warlords so eager to work together. I’ve even heard that one of the Dhakaani clans have asked to march with him. The Kech Shaarat-the Blade Bearers. Have you met one of them yet?”

“Their ambassador is Kroon Dhakaan,” Ashi answered. “A hobgoblin with the shoulders of a bugbear.”

“Cho. That’s him.” Munta looked out the window again. “Real war, Ashi. And I won’t fight it. Tariic’s ‘honor’ to an aged warlord. I was old when Haruuc first proposed his dream of a land for the dar! What I’ve done for Darguun, what I’ve experienced, and Haruuc never denied me the chance to take up my sword again. Just recently in Droaam-” His ears flattened and he took another drink. “But Tariic won’t even let me take a place in the command tent. He gives me gold and grants favored rank to the warriors of my clan, but he won’t allow me to see the battlefield. And while he said it, I just bowed like a gnome. Maabet, he has a presence. He could be greater than Haruuc.”

Ashi pressed her lips together for a moment, resisting the urge to warn Munta of the danger that faced them, before she spoke. “Munta, have you seen Geth today?”

“Ah!” Munta gulped the rest of his korluaat, the loose skin of his throat folding in on itself as he swallowed. “I ramble like a gnome, too. I saw Geth this morning. He seemed to be in a hurry, but he said that if I saw you, I should tell you to talk to Razu if you hadn’t already.”

Ashi’s heart leaped. “Did he say why?”

“No. Some ritual. I suppose.” Munta looked down the length of the hall of honor and nodded his head. “She’s there.”

Ashi saw the head of Razu’s staff before she saw the mistress of rituals. “Ta muut, Munta,” she said. “I’m sorry I have to leave you.”

The old warlord just grunted. “Come back when you want,” he said. “I’m not going anywhere.” He waved his empty goblet at the nearest servant.

Razu must have caught a glimpse of Ashi’s approach, because she ended her conversation with the hobgoblin she’d been speaking to and fell into step alongside Ashi, guiding her to an empty part of the hall. “I have a message for you, Lady Ashi,” she said. “Geth told me to give it to you or to Midian, whoever I saw first. At the change of the second watch tonight, you’re both to meet him where the duur’kala sang and the sword woke.” She looked a little confused by her own words. “He said you’d understand.”

Ashi kept her face carefully neutral, even though her heart was now jumping like a child at play. “When did he give you the message?” she asked.

“This morning. I told him I’m no messenger, but he said I was the only one he trusted.” Her thin face flushed with pleasure.

“You did well, Razu.” Ashi hesitated for a moment, then asked, “Has it seemed to you that Geth has been acting strangely lately? Nervous and tense, maybe?”

Razu’s ears flicked and her mouth pursed primly. “Lady, he has held the throne as Lhesh Haruuc’s shava and now he guides Lhesh Tariic. If he seems tense, surely he has reason to be.”

“I see.” Maybe that made sense. Ashi bent her head to Razu. “Ta muut.”

The mistress of rituals bent her head in return and moved off into the hall. Ashi turned to the door where Aruget waited, holding herself to a sedate pace so that it wouldn’t look too much like she was rushing away. The goblet of korluaat, the level of the beverage undiminished since she’d picked it up, she left with a servant near the door. Aruget’s ears rose when he saw her.

“You found something,” he said softly as they walked away.

Ashi led him down the stairs before she whispered the message Razu had passed her. “I know where the duur’kala sang and the sword woke,” she said. “It’s the roof of Khaar Mbar’ost where Ekhaas, Senen, and another duur’kala worked a spell to wake Wrath so Geth could locate the Rod of Kings.”

Aruget’s ears dropped again. “The roof?” he asked.

She could guess what he was thinking. “A good place for a secret meeting, but also a good place for a trap. Maybe too good. If someone was planning an ambush, there are places that would create a lot less suspicion.”

“Maybe,” Aruget said doubtfully. “I’m coming with you.”

She glanced at him. His face was hard. “It is my muut.”‘

Ashi hesitated, then nodded. “We’ll go early. Just in case.”

“It would be safest not to go at all,”

“Safe hasn’t gotten us any answers so far. Let’s find Midian.”

When the time came for sleep, Ashi stretched out fully clothed on her bed, stared out the open window of her bedchamber, and waited. In her own chamber on the other side of the sitting room, Vounn would be pulling on nightclothes, slipping between sheets, and drifting off to sleep.

The night was dark-the gathered lights of Rhukaan Draal cast a thin glow on the underside of low clouds. The wind had dropped as if the clouds had choked it off. There would be rain before dawn. Ashi kept her mind alert with the same games she had played while stalking the Shadow Marches. Naming the constellations hidden by the clouds. Counting the bones in her hands against the ancient rhyme of the broken blade. Reciting her lineage, a task that, when she was part of the Bonetree Clan, she was only able to do one side of. Since coming to Deneith, she’d learned to fill in the other as well, eldest child of eldest child. “Ashi, daughter of Ner,” she murmured to the rafters of her ceiling, “son of Kagan, son of Tyman, son of Joherra, daughter of Wroenna, daughter of Maal…”

Each name was like a charm. In the tradition of the clans of the Shadow Marches, a bit of the power of each ancestor filtered down to her. The bloodline of House Deneith was the same, deeds accumulating in a heritage of honor, the magic of the Mark of Sentinel ebbing and flowing over time. As a girl, sitting and pointlessly sharpening the eternally keen blade of the sword that her father had inherited from his, had she ever dreamed that she would come so far and see so much?

She guessed that it was approaching the changing of the watch. Time to leave. She rose, slipped sword into scabbard by touch, and closed the shutters on the gathering storm. Hand on the door, she paused, gathered her will, and invoked her dragonmark. Warmth flashed through the pattern that covered her skin. She could almost imagine she saw a faint glow in the darkness, then the clarity that the mark granted settled over her like a splash of cold water. Silent as a shadow, she opened the door and crossed the sitting room.

Of the two guards on duty outside the chamber, only one-a young hobgoblin, new to the service of Khaar Mbar’ost-started when she emerged. The other was Aruget. He glanced at Ashi, then at the younger guard. “Remain,” he said in Goblin. “We will return.”

“Mazo.” The young guard thumped his chest with a fist.

They avoided the main stairs, instead taking the narrower flight of stairs that Ashi had raced up after Tariic’s coronation. Midian was waiting for them there and joined them in their silent climb. When she’d told the gnome about Geth’s message, he’d had the same suspicions as they had. Like them, he’d come ready for a fight. Just in case. In one hand he gripped a polished metal baton-a snap of his wrist, Ashi knew, would pop a slim curved head out of the shaft, transforming the baton into a deadly little pick. On his belt he wore several large pouches, a more convenient version of the backpack he’d worn during their quest for the rod and from which he’d produced a number of cunning magical devices.

“What are you carrying tonight, Midian?” she asked.

“What aren’t I carrying?” was his grim response. “I don’t think I entirely like this, Ashi.”

“I know I don’t,” said Aruget.

“Tell that to Geth when we see him,” Ashi told them both.

The stairs ended as they approached the top of the fortress’s central tower. They were forced onto the main stairs, but they encountered no one. When even the central stairs ended, only a dark, tightly wound spiral staircase remained. Midian produced a tiny everbright lantern from a pouch. A rotating cover allowed him to release a narrow slit of light, just enough for Ashi to see.

She put her foot on the first stair, only to have Aruget push her aside and take the lead, sword ready and ears high.

Ashi clenched her teeth.

Midian just nudged her. “If he wants to go first, let him!”

A trap door-closed-covered a final set of steep open steps above a small landing at the head of the stairs. Aruget waited until she and Midian were with him, then gestured for Midian to close the lantern. Darkness cloaked the cramped space. Ashi’s first hint that Aruget had opened the trap door was a sudden cool draft that carried the smell of imminent rain. The hinges had been well-oiled. After a moment, she could make out the slightly less dark gap of the raised trap, partly blocked by Aruget’s head.

The hobgoblin’s vague silhouette turned. “He’s already here,” he whispered. “He’s early, too.”

“I don’t blame him,” said Ashi. She drew her sword. “Go.”

Aruget threw the trap door open violently and surged through so quickly he was out and looking around before it had even crashed down on the stones of the roof. Ashi came up hard after him, alert as well. About fifteen paces away, on the far side of the roof, a figure whirled around. A covered lantern snapped open, its light glaring into their eyes for a moment.

Geth’s voice came out of the dark. “Ashi!”

She felt a burst of relief. The roof was clear. Beyond the light of the lantern, she could make out the distinctive crouch of the shifter’s body, his thick hair blowing in the wind. He didn’t move.

She took a few steps toward him. “Geth! Rond betch, what’s been going on? We’ve been trying to talk to you since the coronation.” She shaded her eyes with her free hand.

“I know. I’m sorry. Things have gotten… difficult.” Geth shifted the lantern and opened its other sides so that light spilled across the roof, catching him in its glow. He was dressed in clothing Ashi recognized, but just as Midian had told her, he wasn’t wearing Wrath. She opened her mouth ready to ask him where the sword was, when two more things struck her.

He carried a lantern-but he didn’t need one. Geth could see in the dark.

And not only wasn’t he wearing Wrath, he wasn’t wearing the collar of black stones that had belonged to his fallen friend Adolan. He might have left the sword somewhere. He would never have taken off the collar.

Her sword snapped up. “This isn’t Geth.”

Too late.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Aruget jerk, his hand grabbing for his throat as something looped around his neck. A strangler’s noose of fine braided leather. The hobgoblin’s fingers were too slow and the noose tightened before they could close on it. Ashi spun, following the dark line of the leather cord.

As if he’d materialized out of the night itself, Makka stood behind the trap door. Where had he-? She found the answer before she’d even thought the question. A waist-high wall surrounded the roof. He must have been hanging over it.

The bugbear’s muscles bulged and he heaved hard on the cord. Aruget flew back, dragged by the neck, and slammed down onto the roof. His sword went skittering away. Ashi had a brief glimpse of his contorted face, hands still grabbing for the noose, and of Makka, dropping the cord. Her sword hung at his side, but he ignored it and instead snatched a thick club from a thong hanging down his back.

Then whoever played at being Geth snapped shut the lantern.

Again darkness, this time overlaid by the bright afterimages of the lantern. The trap door banged shut, an obstacle to easy escape, and she could imagine Makka coming for her. “Midian, I need light!” she shouted, as she threw herself blindly aside. Just in time. Something heavy whistled past her. She lashed out with her sword, but found nothing except empty air.

“Close your eyes!”

“That won’t help!” A bulky shape shifted in the shadows. She struck again and came closer. This time her blow was blocked. The shape moved, angling for an advantage.

“Do it now!”

She squeezed her eyes shut-just as something shattered at her feet and an intense flash lit up the inside of her eyelids in shades of red. Makka roared. Ashi forced her watering eyes open again. Midian had his tiny lantern open and its light swung across the rooftop. Aruget, still down, dragged at the noose around his throat. Makka shook his head, blinked furiously, and backed away, club held warily in a guard position. Even though the glare of the flash still danced in her vision, she lunged for him.

He sensed her. The club slapped at her sword in an awkward parry. Ashi twisted and the blade skipped around to rip a thin line up Makka’s forearm. He growled and pulled back further. Dropping his lantern, Midian moved in on the bugbear’s other side with his pick held low.

Makka’s squinting eyes swung between them and he shouted, “Ko!”

At the far end of the roof, the figure that was not Geth bent and came up with a crossbow aimed at Midian. The bow steadied and snapped in the same movement.

Midian tumbled backward. The steelhead of the crossbow bolt made sparks as it hit the stone of the roof.

“Take him!” Ashi ordered the gnome, but she hardly needed to have bothered. Midian was already darting across the rooftop to prevent another attack. Ko… Ashi realized she knew the name. The changeling Geth had found imprisoned in Khaar Mbar’ost’s dungeons.

She spun back to Makka, teeth clenched. “Where’s Geth?” she demanded, thrusting at the bugbear. “Baano a Geth?”

He snarled in response and stopped her blow with a solid block. He was still blinking but his eyes were clear. She pressed her attack, feeling her anger grow inside her. “Baano a Geth?” she screamed again.

“Waiting for you!” Makka roared in Goblin. His club swung back. “Fury give me strength!”

For the barest instant, the thin shadows of the rooftop seemed to pull tight around Makka, making the livid scar of the bat-winged serpent on his broad chest leap out in contrast. Then his club came around hard and fast, too fast for Ashi to avoid. It hit with all of the bugbear’s strength and the impact of it drove agony into her left shoulder. The hot rage behind the blow was like a physical force, throwing her across the rooftop. Her back hit the low wall, bringing another burst of pain and sending her toppling back.

Empty space and the sparse lights of Rhukaan Draal swung around her. Her sword dropped from her hand and vanished in the darkness below. She tried to throw her weight forward, back to safety.

A massive hairy hand seized her forearm, yanking her back and whipping her across the roof. Ashi caught a glimpse of Makka, then she was tumbling across the stones. She ended up flat on her back and gasping for breath. A single fat drop of water hit the center of her forehead. The rain had come.

“Alive,” she heard Makka growl. “For now.”

She forced herself to twist over onto her belly, then up onto her knees. On the far side of the roof, Midian fought the changeling who wore Geth’s face, pick flashing and clashing against a long, heavy knife. The changeling looked panicked. He gave ground with each exchange. The gnome had him overmatched. Much closer, however, Makka stalked across the rooftop. In the up-cast light of Midian’s lantern, his face was a demonic mask.

Aruget’s dropped sword lay within reach to her right. Ashi grabbed for it but her throbbing left shoulder gave out and she tumbled back to the rain-dappled stones. Makka raised his club.

Another figure launched itself out of the shadows, slamming into him shoulder first. Aruget. The tackle sent Makka sprawling across the roof. Ashi sucked breath between her teeth and lurched to her feet, bringing up the hobgoblin’s sword. Aruget, however, seized her arm and wrenched her around, dragging her toward the trap door.

“Aruget! No-”

“Down!” he rasped. His throat showed deep red marks from Makka’s noose. “Somewhere we can’t fall.”

Ashi twisted in his grasp. Makka was rising. Midian still battered at Ko’s desperate defense-but as Aruget snatched up the lantern and sent shadows dancing across the rooftop, he glanced away. Ashi saw surprise flicker across his face.

Ko seized the moment of distraction. His blade licked past Midian’s pick and slashed down his side. The gnome jumped back, blood mixing with rain on the stones.

“Midian!” Ashi tried to pull away, but Aruget held her tight as he stooped to yank open the trap door.

Makka roared and charged them. Ashi screamed fury in return and tore herself free.

Aruget grabbed her again, spun her around, and dropped her through the door. Her scream turned into a yelp. She just missed catching her feet on the steep steps, and her knees buckled as she hit the small landing below with a jarring impact. The lantern clattered down beside her, the metal shield breaking off but the magical core shining steady. She looked up just in time to see Aruget pull the trap door closed after himself. A heartbeat later, the door jerked ferociously as Makka heaved at it from the other side, but Aruget had his feet hooked into the steps. He held the handle of the door with one hand and dug into a pouch at his belt with the other. It emerged holding some kind of nail or spike. The hobgoblin slammed the nail up into the wood of the door. There was a shimmer of blue light. Aruget released his hold and dropped down beside her.

The door continued to shake under Makka’s strength, but it didn’t open. Aruget took Ashi’s arm and pulled her to her feet. “Go!”

“But Midian-”

Aruget’s face was strangely harsh. “Midian can look after himself.” He forced her onto the spiral stairs.

Ashi pushed against him. “We have to go back for him!”

“We can’t go back. That door isn’t opening again until it’s broken in,” Aruget said. “We have to get you to safety. Makka couldn’t have set this trap without Tariic’s knowledge and aid. Khaar Mbar’ost isn’t safe for you anymore, Ashi.”

She started to argue, to accuse him of betraying Midian and leaving him for Makka, but the words didn’t reach her mouth.

Normally Aruget spoke the human language with a thick accent. All trace of that accent had suddenly vanished. She stared at him. His ears flicked and lay back.

Then before either of them could say anything, there were other sounds on the spiral stairs. The tread of climbing footsteps. The rattle of armor. Many footsteps and much armor. A hobgoblin’s voice floated up. “Alive! She must be taken alive!”

“Khyberit gentis,” Ashi cursed.

Aruget let out a sharp hiss, then he grabbed Ashi once again, gripping her tightly. “Ashi,” he whispered in her ear, “you have to trust me. Forget Midian-this is about you and me now. I think I can get us out of this, but you have to trust me. I’m on your side. Understand?”

“I-”

“Good.” He pulled the sword from her hand. “Act defeated and frightened.”

He pushed her on down the stairs. The light of the lantern, left behind on the landing, faded quickly and Aruget pushed her a little too fast so that she stumbled and groped in the dark. Between her stumbling feet and Aruget’s sword and armor they made more noise than the soldiers coming up. A voice echoed along the stairs, asking in Goblin, “Who’s there?”

“I have her!”

Ashi flinched and almost fell. The voice, also speaking Goblin, that came from over her shoulder sounded nothing like Aruget. It was deeper and much rougher. The hand on her arm tightened, holding her up, and the voice continued. “I’ve got the Deneith woman, but Makka needs help. She managed to seal the roof door somehow. Makka’s stuck up there.”

A dim glow came up the stairs now and Ashi could see the silhouettes of hobgoblin guards. “Who are you?” the voice from below demanded. “Daavn said Makka wouldn’t let any guards come with him.”

“Do you want to question what Makka said, or do you want to make Daavn happy?”

They’d reached the first of the ascending guards. The stairs were narrow. There was barely room to pass. Aruget pushed by the first guards. Ashi could smell their sweat and the sour vinegar smell of dar food on them. They glared at her with unfriendly eyes as she squeezed along. They muttered among themselves. One of them called down, “It’s her, chib!”

The voice from below cursed, then shouted. “Pass her along! We’ll take her to Daavn.” Ashi could see the speaker, a larger hobgoblin at the foot of the spiral stairs, the light from the main stairs illuminating him.

“Maabet,” said Aruget. “I’m taking her to Daavn. I captured her. This is my muut.” He paused just above the large hobgoblin. “He wanted her brought right to him, didn’t he? Do you want to keep Makka waiting out in the rain while you take her”-he shook Ashi-“to Daavn? He’s already angry.”

The other hobgoblin hesitated, his ears up. Makka’s attacks on the door were loud. Finally the hobgoblin’s ears dropped. “Take her,” he said, jerking his head at the main stairs. Then he slapped the hobgoblin ahead of him. “Get moving!” he shouted.

He spared one last hostile glance at Ashi as she pushed past him, then she was off the spiral stairs and back in the open. Aruget stayed at her back. “Keep going,” he said in that strange deep voice. “Remember you’re my prisoner.”

They made it down only a few steps before a call came back to them from above. “You!” It was the large hobgoblin again. Ashi felt Aruget stiffen but he kept pushing her onward. “You can’t take her by yourself. She could get away from you. You better let me help you.”

“I can handle her,” Aruget growled. “Go back to your men.”

“They can open a door.” The other hobgoblin’s footsteps closed on them. Aruget paused. “Yes,” said the hobgoblin. There was ambition in his voice. “Enough muut in this to share-”

Aruget’s hand left her arm as he whirled. The other hobgoblin’s words ended in the sound of ripping flesh, a slight wheeze, and the clatter of a falling body. Ashi spun around-and froze, staring.

Not at the hobgoblin sprawled with his throat slashed open, but at the other hobgoblin on the stairs. The one who carried Aruget’s bloody sword and wore Aruget’s armor, but who didn’t wear his face.

He looked back at her for an instant, then his features blurred and reshaped themselves until Aruget faced her again.

Ashi’s voice almost caught in her throat, but she forced it out. “You’re a changeling?”