Ruhm climbed up and started hauling out chunks of steel, throwing them into their tracks. The others were beginning to reach the wagon, and one by one they climbed in, tossing out the pieces they could lift.
Then they were getting close enough to the gate to worry Aric. This would be the hard part. “Everyone inside, now!” he called. “Get those doors closed!”
His companions did as he said. Behind them, Aric knew, was a trail of metal pieces and a man’s head. But the mekillot had managed a little more speed, as the load lightened. Anyone standing on top of the Mekillot Gate could look back and see that they had shed cargo, but only the musicians were there, and they were focused on their playing. The guards at the gate danced without enthusiasm or expression, probably tired by now of watching the argosies roll past. Aric summoned Corlan to stand beside him at the reins, and the guards waved them in with hardly a glance.
“We’re in,” Corlan said as the gates clanged shut behind them. “Now what?”
Aric had no answer. He had only worked out how to get inside the city walls. From there, he had no plans.
Sage’s Square!” Tunsall said from the darkness of the argosy’s interior.
“What?”
“All the argosies will be at Sage’s Square. Nibenay will want the people to see them. They may even be stopped and opened up so the people can see all the metal they’ve brought back. They’ll be well guarded, of course, but they’ll be in a public place for at least a day or two.”
Tunsall was right. There were still smatterings of onlookers lining the road toward Sage’s Square, although no doubt there had been many more at the front of the expedition.
“We’ll go to the Square,” he said. “But then what?”
“Then on to the Naggaramakam,” Sheridia said. “That’s where Kadya is.”
That made sense, but Aric knew the doing of it would be more complicated. He guided the mekillot, Corlan still beside him so anyone looking inside would see two people, as there had been, and they made their way into Sage’s Square. There amid the thick grove of agafari trees, the other argosies had been parked, some with their backs open, and throngs of people gazed past the guards at the treasure within.
Instead of following suit, Aric guided his mekillot around the square’s outer rim. At the entrance to the road leading toward the Naggaramakam—this road considerably narrower than the first, and roundabout, as no roads led directly to the Shadow King’s private estate—two city guards blocked the way.
“Why have you not pulled over?” one asked.
“We were told that the Shadow King wants to see one load for himself,” Corlan answered. They had briefly discussed this possibility, and Aric was glad they had. “You don’t expect him to come to where all those people are, do you?”
“I suppose not.”
“Then get out of our way, imbecile!” Corlan shouted at the man with the imperious air of one used to being obeyed. Aric had never known that sensation, and likely never would.
Corlan was convincing enough, and the two guards stepped away, letting them pass. The mekillot followed Aric’s urging, and soon the big armored wagon made its way down a road barely wide enough to let it pass without scraping the ornately sculpted buildings on either side.
“This might work,” Myrana said after they had passed the guards.
“What happens inside Naggaramakam?” Ruhm asked.
The dwarf’s voice bounced off the argosy’s walls. “We kill the demon!”
“That might not be so simple,” Tunsall said. “She’ll be surrounded by other templars, and slave guards. We’ll be strangers, barging in—if we can get in—and attacking one of their own.”
“We need some way to make Tallik show himself,” Myrana said.
“There might be a way to do that,” Sheridia said.
“How?” Myrana asked.
“Everyone in Nibenay has heard rumors about the Shadow King’s palace,” Sheridia explained. “It’s built in the shape of his head. His many wives are carved into it, forming his hair.”
“How does that help?” Myrana asked.
“It’s said that those sculptures are more than just carvings in stone,” Sheridia said. “That there’s some essence of each wife contained in the figure. If one can destroy the figure, that forces the templar wife to reveal her true self. Naturally, it has never happened, that I know of. And I’m certain the palace is a nest of secrets many layers deep. I’m only telling it because I’ve heard it spoken, more than once, and from people with far vaster stores of knowledge than mine.”
“It sounds worth a try,” Aric said from the front.
“If we can figure out which of those many figures represents Kadya,” Solyara said. “And find a way to destroy it.”
“We’ll have a chance soon enough!” Corlan called. The argosy was just rounding a bend. “We’re at the gates!”
The Naggaramakam was surrounded by walls towering fifty feet high. Beyond those walls, when one was far enough back, the tops of huge agafari trees, in the Shadow King’s private garden, could be seen. The sun had almost sunk below the horizon; in the shadow of those walls it was already dusk.
As the wagon drew up to the massive wooden gates, Aric pondered the impossibility of the task ahead of them. They had to venture into the inner city, the Forbidden Dominion, which no one had ever done and lived to tell about. Once there they had to identify which of hundreds of sculptures, on a tall palace, stood for a particular templar wife. They had to destroy that, revealing the demon inside—they hoped. And then they had to destroy the demon, and hope that because they had shown it for what it was, the other templars, and the Shadow King himself, would let them leave again.
He had been surprised when the family Thrace had agreed to come to Nibenay, after Myklan’s death. If they survived the next few minutes, that surprise would be dwarfed by the astonishment he would feel.
A trio of goliath soldiers stood before the gate into the Naggaramakam. “Turn away!” one shouted. “There is no admittance here!”
“But the Shadow King has asked to have a wagonload of steel brought before him for his inspection,” Aric argued. “We’ve been ordered here by the templar Kadya!”
The soldiers traded glances, uncertain but made anxious by the mention of Kadya’s name. “We’ve heard no such orders,” one of them said.
“Open the gates, and let us pass!” Aric insisted. “Just because you’re not trusted with this information doesn’t mean we don’t have a mission to fulfill!”
“No one comes through these gates,” the soldier said. “Except templars and slaves—”
“What do you think we are?” Aric asked.
“No slave known to me.”
“And you know every slave who ever set foot in the Naggaramakam?”
“No …”
“Open the gate. When we find Kadya we’ll ask her if she’d like to discuss this with you in person!”
The guard swallowed, but made a gesture toward whatever unseen operator controlled the gates. Chains rattled and the wooden barricades began to part. As soon as they did, Aric prodded the mekillot ahead, in case the soldiers changed their minds.
As the argosy surged forward, one of the goliath soldiers peered inside the front window. Corlan’s clothing was torn and filthy from the trip, but still obviously of expensive make. And inside, crowded in the shadows but still visible, were the rest. “Stop!” the soldier cried. “It’s a trick! Close the gate!”
It took a few moments for the gate’s direction to reverse, with an agitated clanking and grinding of the chain. The soldiers swarmed around the argosy, more joining the first three. Aric urged the huge lizard on, and although the closing gates rasped against the wagon’s sides, it passed between them.