Sherril scowled. He hated it when anyone knew something before him. Petru felt a moment of triumph for having been right first, but the tightening sensation around his brows increased again. He winced. So did Sherril.
“He is trying to pierce through the veil the Dancers put around us,” the counselor said. “He didn’t want an exchange of culture. He wanted to learn how the Dance protects us so he could learn how to combat our rituals.”
“We could ask Lord Tae. I must go to him,” young Gilas piped up, at Emoro’s elbow. The warrior’s eyes looked hazy. “He is calling me.”
Ysella marched to him and slapped him, hard. He staggered backward a pace on the black and white tiles, his feet slipping. He looked at her in shock, but his wits were restored.
“We are doomed,” Sherril said glumly.
“No,” Emoro said. “We must fight free. Lord Tae is too treacherous. We were wrong to trust him.”
“We had to try,” Sherril reminded them. “The alternative is weeks more on the road without adequate supplies. The rest of the clan is behind us. The gates of the city will open at dawn. We must make our way there now.”
“With every Liskash in the city under his control?” Petru said, horrified at the thought of being overwhelmed by lizards. He brushed at his fur frantically. “We would never make it.”
“Then we must make him let us go,” Emoro said, with a fearsome snarl.
“If he hasn’t foreseen our response and moved to counter it,” Sherril retorted.
Almost as he said it, Liskash in full uniform with knives and spears began to pour over the front wall, exactly where Emoro had told him he feared they would.
“Halt! Surrender in Lord Tae’s name!”
“He has,” Petru said. His heart quailed at the sight of dozens of lizards racing from the roof perch to all three ladders leading down to the first walkway. He did not want to be a slave in this place! “We’re trapped!”
“To the rear wall,” Emoro ordered them. “There are ladders there the servants use. They’re thinner and can bear less weight, but they’ll do. There is usually only one guard at the bottom. Go. We will halt them, or at least slow them down. Warriors, to me!” He glared at Petru. “Hurry! Run! Leave your luggage.”
“I will not!” Petru said, outraged at the notion of abandoning his lovely jewelry, his perfumes, or his treasured cosmetics to the lizards.
“It may be your possessions or your life,” Sherril said.
“Well…” Petru chewed on his lip, considering which was worse. Emoro smacked him in the ear like a kitten. His eyes glowed. That was out of character for him. He was usually submissive to Petru. “You’ll pay for that.”
Emoro looked unrepentant. “I will, if it’s what it takes to save your life. Go! I will be right behind you.”
“You had better.” Petru reached out and stroked his cheek. He grabbed a Dancer with each hand and hurried them across the courtyard. Sherril was already clambering upward. They heard wails of warning coming too late from the outside.
If Aedonniss didn’t spare Emoro, He would be sorry when Petru reached his court!
The sky had just begun to glow at the horizon when Scaro heard scrabbling sounds. He woke from the light doze he had allowed himself, propped up against the cool, sweating wall next to the ladder. It was too much to hope that the Mrem girls he had flirted with the night before had come back for a quick assignation. No, this was a truly furtive sound.
Neer had heard it, too. He opened lamplike eyes toward Scaro, and signaled a question. Scaro nodded. It took only a moment for his sensitive ears to pinpoint where the sounds were coming from. His own eyes widened as he counted sounds. Sixty, seventy, over a hundred Liskash!
Treacherous worm, Scaro knew he couldn’t trust him! He wanted slaves, not art! He threw back his head to sound the alarm, and felt that he couldn’t draw a single breath. His abdomen hollowed out as he tried to drag in air, but it was as if his body would not obey. He dropped to his knees. So did Neer and the Mrem on his other side. The Liskash noble was strangling them all at once from afar. Scaro’s vision darkened. He begged Aedonniss for delivery and heard a mocking presence in his mind. Scaro growled, and choked his blocked throat.
You do not control me, he told Lord Tae, fighting to stay conscious. You are not my god. Let…me…go!
He threw his body against the ladder, pushing it over. It clattered to the cobblestones.
Out of the alleyways and doorways opposite the residence, bulky, gray Liskash in leather tunics poured. Their pinched snouts peered out from leather caps. All of them had spears, shelds and knives. In the center of Scaro’s darkened vision, a looming figure with a bronze badge on his cap stooped with a long knife. His throat was to be cut.
Then the grip on his mind loosened and melted away. His belly relaxed. Writhing on his back, Scaro gasped in breaths of air. A sensation of warmth surrounded him, like a mother embracing her kits. The Dancers had reestablished their protection of him and his warriors!
Taking no time for reflection, he saw the knife descend in an arc. He rolled to one side in plenty of time. Thanks be to Aedonniss that the insect-eating Liskash were so slow in their reactions! Scaro sprang up before the lizard officer could react and kicked the knife out of his hand. He leaped, rolled again, and came up with the dagger. The officer was reaching around him for his spear when Scaro stepped in, palmed his chin upward and cut his throat with his own knife. Scaro grabbed for the nearest cold body with dagger and claws out.
His vision brightened. Scaro took in the numbers streaming past him. The first hundred and a hundred more had righted the ladders and were climbing the walls. He signed to Neer and one other warrior to follow them. They kicked as many Liskash off the rungs as they could, fighting their way to the top. Scaro danced on his toes, avoiding thrusts by Liskash soldiers with incredible ease. Lord Tae was no general. He must want to capture the prize that no noble had ever possessed.
“Save the Dancers!” he bellowed.
Six of them could not turn back the tide. Emoro had given his orders once they had seen the quarters in which the Mrem would be housed. Scaro knew which way they would try to escape.
“Mrem, with me!” Scaro shouted. The other three kicked away from the onrush, leaving dead Liskash in their wake.
He had patrolled the perimeter of the cursed building over and over again in the dark. Within a handspan he knew exactly where the ladders at the rear were placed. They rounded the rear of the building.
“Scaro!” A voice echoed down to him from above. He moved out from the high wall looked up and saw Emoro racing along the narrow walkway at the top of the pylon. Scaro counted the warriors with him. Half were missing. They must be defending within. But the Dancers were safe. Ysella’s golden eyes were wide and terrified. Cleotra only looked angry. That was good. “What’s the matter with you, Drillmaster? There were only two hundred of them?”
“Thought you could use the wakeup,” Scaro called.
“Thanks, boy! An eighthday of sleep would have been too much for me!”
“We’ll guard your way,” Scaro said. “I can lead you to the gates. I know several narrow ways where they will have trouble sending large forces after us.”
“No!” Cleotra shouted, furiously. “We’re going for the castle. Every hand will be turned against us unless we stop Lord Tae himself!”
“A Liskash noble?” Scaro asked. But those decisions were not his. “I will get you there safely, Your Sinuousness!”
Each of his warriors had a knife or a spear taken from Liskash they had slain at the front of the building. It wasn’t going to be enough, Scaro knew, but he would die trying.
Cleotra scrambled down the ladder of the third stage, four or five Mrem-heights above him, and stepped aside on the walkway. Scaro realized she was going to jump. She would break her legs! He ran to catch her.