“Better death,” he muttered under his breath, and with a look to either side, he started forward. Soon after, he saw the march, the lines and lines of undead, the horrid blackness, and even though he understood that so much power was flowing out of Talas-dun, and that might make his task all the easier, the sight only filled him with dread.
For in his heart, Bryan of Corning understood that all the goodly armies of all the world could not stand against that force, would be swallowed by the blackness as surely as day gave way to night.
With a growl, the half-elf went on, remembering his role, more determined than ever to get Rhiannon out of Talas-dun. He made the base of the castle wall without incident. “Better death,” he repeated, for he didn’t dare voice his real opinion. For he understood in his heart that if Morgan Thalasi, the Black Warlock, the greatest horror to ever infect Ynis Aielle, ever got him, then death would be the least of his troubles.
But still, his enemy was secure inside that mighty bastion, Bryan knew-secure and unsuspecting. Thalasi was too busy looking for armies to notice the movements of a small and insignificant half-elf. That was Bryan’s only chance; that was why he had set out from Avalon alone. He had to tell himself all of those things repeatedly just to continue, just to be able to put one shaking foot in front of the other.
And so he was moving, but where to go? There was one gate evident, a hundred yards east along the wall, set small between two massive guard houses, but from the torches glowing through window slits there, Bryan recognized that it was well guarded.
He looked up instead, thinking of going over the wall. He could only guess at its height-thirty feet? forty? And the surface, unlike the masoned bricks of Pallendara’s wall, was perfectly smooth, metallic, without a ridge to be seen.
He went to the west, where the sky was wide, the mountainous land falling away suddenly to the sea. As he neared the southwestern corner of the square castle, Bryan heard the waves far below, crashing endlessly against the unyielding cliff wall. A small strip of land, a curving, uneven walkway open to the west, wound behind the castle, generally descending. It seemed plausible to Bryan that this back side, far too narrow and treacherous a path for any invading army, would be the least defended of all, and so on he went, picking his careful way along the slick stones.
Soon after, moonlight slanting over the castle wall, but at an angle that left Bryan in shadow, he heard talking, deep and guttural. He fell to his belly and moved to the next ridge, peering over.
A single talon stood below him, bathed in torchlight, the beast grumbling and complaining as it carried a bucket of slop out an open door to dump into the sea.
“Clean the kitchen, Fogump,” the talon bitched. “Wipe the blimin’ floors, Fogump. Lick me blimin’ feet, Fogump!”
The talon moved to the edge of a small landing and tossed the contents of the bucket over, nearly losing the pot in the act. Overbalanced, the talon just managed to keep a hold on the bucket and to keep its own balance, and it was just setting itself firmly in place again when it felt a sudden explosion against the back of its head.
Mercifully, the beast fell from consciousness as it plummeted down the cliff face, and didn’t see the ocean ready to swallow its remains.
Bryan moved immediately to the open door; a tiny portal leading into the castle’s larders. From his course along the back wall, he realized that he was far below the level of the plateau-indeed the black castle walls began some distance above him, past the natural stones. The half-elf nodded in satisfaction, for it seemed plausible to him that Rhiannon might be in some dungeon below ground level.
Voices from inside the room brought him from his contemplations. He moved to the shadows along the side of the door, clutched his sword tight, and whispered for Brielle, hoping that she would hear.
“Where is you?” a talon barked from just inside the door. “Fogump!”
The talon stepped outside, and then it was dead, in the single swipe of Bryan’s sword. The half-elf headed into the room immediately, where two other talons busied themselves cleaning great buckets of slop. He fell over the first before they ever knew he was there and caught the second just before it reached the small chamber’s inner door, stabbing it hard in the kidney. He stuck it again and again, rushing up so that he could bring his hand over its mouth to stifle its dying screams.
Even as that one slumped dead to the floor, Bryan rushed back across the room and outside, to drag the dead talon back in.
Footsteps in the hall beyond the inner door alerted him that yet another was approaching. He took up a pot in one hand, his sword in the other, and moved beside the door.
The creature came right in, then stopped, stunned.
Bryan smacked it over the head with the pot, shoulder-blocked it out of the way-closing the door as he moved past it-and pinned the beast up against the wall, his sword tip coming right in under its chin, his other hand, free of the dropped pot, slapping across the talon’s mouth.
“If you cry out, I will drive my sword into your puny brain,” Bryan promised, and from the look on the brute’s face, he knew that it understood.
“The woman?” Bryan asked. “The wraith of Mitchell brought a woman here? Do you know this?”
The talon nodded. Bryan felt its hand move a bit along its belt, and he understood its plan.
“Where is she?” He took his hand from the beast’s mouth, but stayed right up against it.
“Down,” the talon said, its answer cut short as Bryan slapped his hand back over its mouth.
Again the half-elf felt the movement along the waist, felt the talon grabbing hold of something.
Bryan’s sword drove up under the creature’s chin, through the roof of its mouth and into its brain. The talon twitched and shuddered and fell limp, upright only because Bryan still had it pinned against the wall. He eased the talon to the floor, taking note of the dagger in its belt.
Then the half-elf set about making the room look as if the talons had engaged in a fight among themselves. He left one dead at the door, but jumbled the other three together, planting the knife of his last kill into one of the wounds of another, then taking the sharp scraper one had been using to clean hardened food from the plates and sliding it into the last talon’s garish wound. With one talon missing, it was likely that any guards uncovering this scene would begin a search for the murderous Fogump. That search should keep them from the dungeons, Bryan reasoned, for what fugitive would deliver himself to Thalasi’s prison?
“Down,” the half-elf muttered. He eased the door open and peeked into the corridor. Torches lined the walls, but they were far-spaced, creating many shadows. Bryan glanced left, then right, looking for some clues.
Nothing.
He went left, moving swiftly and silently, crossing the corridor as he approached every bend to get the best vantage point around it. He took too many turns to keep track, even went through several empty rooms, then slipped into a dark alcove that ended at a door.
He heard the slapping feet of talons beyond and judged from the sound that they were below him, coming up some stairs. Bryan considered the door, then moved to the side of the alcove into which it would open.
He held his breath as the talons-three of them, heavily armed-came through, swinging wide the door then continuing on, the last of the line giving a yank to close the door.
Bryan sucked in his breath even more, for the three stood barely five feet away!
They didn’t notice him, though, and just went on their way.
Through the door went the half-elf, and down the stairs. He passed several landings with doors similar to the one he had come through, but he ignored them, thinking it best to start at the bottom.