"Kastonoph?" she said.
"Yes?" he replied, startled.
"I was just trying to remember your name."
"My friends call me Noph." He continued with the keys. "Ah, got the first one!" He flung back the shackle.
Eidola's arm dropped loosely free. She let out a hiss of pain. "Lift it! Lift it!"
"Lift what?"
"My arm! Now!"
Noph fumbled in the dark. His hand brushed the lady's side, smooth and warm in the harsh coldness. He found her arm and raised it.
"Ah, that's better," she gasped out. "I've been this way for days. We'll have to ease them down slowly. In the meantime, try the same key on the other lock."
"Yes, milady." Still holding her free arm up, Noph stretched across her body to the other shackle. He couldn't quiet reach.
"This is a dungeon, not a boudoir. Touch me if you have to!"
Noph drew a deep breath and leaned against her. The key slid into the shaft-thank Tyr, and the lock clicked. Noph hurriedly flipped open the shackle.
"Up! Up! Lift it!" she growled as her left arm fell.
Noph caught the limb and lifted it. "There-how's that?"
"Better," she whispered, panting.
"Um, Lady Eidola, I'm going to need to lower your arms to get your legs free."
He could sense her jaw clenching. "All right. Slowly- slowly-lower my arms to rest on your shoulders."
Noph nodded. He felt himself blush. What would Piergeiron say to see his young protege pressed against his bride like this, lowering her arms into an embrace? Noph took a step back and drew the lady's arms inward and down. She groaned and arched against him, her limbs trembling. At last, her arms rested on his shoulders.
"All right. That wasn't so bad," the lady sighed. "Now, just as slowly, kneel down to open the shackle on my legs."
"Yes."
Stiffly, Noph slid down into the cold, black waters. Eidola's arms dragged along his descending shoulders, and she moaned. The flood lapped at her knees. He could see her wavering reflection in the water, caught and shattered by ripples and waves into a thousand Ei-dolas. Noph settled beside her feet and allowed himself a huff of air.
Get hold of yourself, he thought. What's wrong with you?
The cold felt good on his feverish body. He reached beneath the chill surface, ran his hand from her delicate feet to her ankle and onto the first gentle rise of her calf. The stout iron casement was just above. Still clutching the key that had released her hands, he found the slot and slid the metal rod gently in. A click answered the turn of the key, and the iron shackle swung open.
"You're free!" he said.
Clutching his head now, Eidola tried to step from the wall. Something at her midsection tugged. "Damn. That's right. There's one more restraint-this wretched chastity belt."
"Chastity belt?" Noph sputtered. "Of all the barbaric-Surely Piergeiron hadn't fitted you with-"
"No, not him. My captors. What good is a kidnapped virgin unless she remains one?"
"B-But why do you want m-me to remove your ch-ch-chas-?"
"Calm down," Eidola replied. "It's enspelled to keep me from running away, from disobeying my captors. The buckles are in back."
Dutifully, Noph rose from the black flood. His clothes clung uncomfortably against him.
"Hurry up!" Eidola begged.
Noph reached around the lady's warm, smooth hips and just inside her outer shift. He gently felt along her spine for the buckles of her belt.
"Your fingers are cold," she said.
"I'm trying to hurry," Noph replied.
He found the buckles and breathed a nervous sigh. Numb fingers worked at the leather. The first strap popped loose, flinging up a fingerful of water. Noph startled, almost hollering. As he fiddled with the next two buckles, he tried to make conversation. 'You know, I used to be a paladin. Now I'm a pirate."
Eidola's voice was chilly. "Why would a pirate want to rescue me?"
"Oh, the others don't. They want to kill you. They think you're an agent of the Unseen."
"And what if I am?"
His cold fingers paused, the last buckle of the belt halfway undone.
The golden lasso, he thought. The lasso of truth. It will show what you really are.
A splash came in the hall, interrupting his thoughts. Then another splash, and another.
"Hurry," she whispered. "It's Lord Garkim!"
Noph drew his hand away from her hips and reached for the lasso. He undid the catch and felt the loops drop into his hand.
"Hurry!" she breathed.
He slipped the lasso over her head… and everything changed.
Lady Eidola was gone.
In her place was a scale-skinned gray beast with large, empty eyes.
A greater doppleganger.
Next moment, she was a convulsing crocodile.
The monster's scaly midsection burst the final buckle, and the crocodile fell on Noph. Its teeth flashed in the darkness and fastened on his chest. With a terrific splash, it dragged him down beneath the icy murk.
Interlude
Condemnation
I'm mesmerized by your warm, warm flesh, cold monstrosity beneath.
You're the third lady… there was Aleena Paladin-star she is spirit, an angel hello, Aleena… there was Sharessa No-Angel a creature of flesh carnal… there is you, infernal woman demonspawn.
You're all the same; I'm mesmerized by you… powerful, elegant, mysterious, unattainable… all the same.
You can't be held… no man, not even a kidnapper, can hold you.. can't be held… no fingers, no claws, nothing in all of creation not even a golden, unerring lasso… you can't be held… I can't hold you… are killing me for trying
… your teeth meet between my ribs… hello, Teeth.
You hear something… where are those nice warm teeth now where is your muscle-back… I drift in cold ink… you are done with me you held me and are done… I am dead already.
I have not climbed the stormy tops… I have not slain a dozen foes… I have not slain even you… maybe they will still shoehorn me into the dinghy and toss the comet-torch to flare up and say there goes another piece of the great pirate Blackfingers Ralingor… because after all I've now had just about everything that was soft in me torn away.
Chapter 10
We heard and saw it all.
We did not hear it with our own ears, bleeding above our ruined palace as we crushed fiends in our tentacles.
We did not see it with our own eyes, reaching where our flesh could not to slay with spell and thought among the teeming demons.
We heard and saw it with our lower mind, our animal mind. We knew it not so much by sound and sight but by smell, knew the goodness and badness of it.
This was how the destroyers of Doegan met again.
Their second convergence was in every way the oppo site of their first. They met not in a morning-bright plaza, but in a night-dark dungeon. Only Trandon's pendant lit the way for the paladins, and for the pirates only makeshift torches, casting a feverish glow across the groin vaults. The two groups did not arrive slowly, either, one party on either side of a pristine fountain; they spilled into the dungeon from opposite staircases, glimpsed each other and rushed together. They met and fought before an open cell door, their hammers and cutlasses crashing against each other to prevent entry to their foes. And on either side of the fray the groups were minus a man. The paladins had lost the young convert Noph, and the pirates had lost the old veteran, Anvil.
The only thing that had remained the same was that both sides still sought the Lady Eidola, one for rescue and the other for murder.
Great Miltiades, champion of virtue, battled haft to hilt with agile Entreri, champion of vice. Sword and warhammer clashed against one another, sending showers of sparks hissing into the water that rose to their knees.
"Give way, Entreri," snarled Miltiades. "You will not prevail here. You shall have to slay every last one of us before you lay a hand upon Lady Eidola."