"He's not coming," the minotaur rumbled, pointing toward the crowd.
In chains now, Gerrard rode away from the city aback the snow-white Jhovall.
"The prithonerth are loothe!" shouted the guard captain even as he crumpled to the floor of the lift. "They're loothe! Guardth!"
Nearby, an officer heard the slurred call for help. He turned, gestured toward the lift, and barked orders to his contingent. Swords flashed out. Soldiers converged.
"Take us up, Hanna," Sisay shouted. She flung away her shackles, grabbed up a trident from one of the fallen guards, and swung it about, smashing the butt into the face of a new arrival. "Take us up!"
Sudden motion flung down the last of the drugged guards. The lift lurched upward. It pulled free of the ground. Its cage door clanged loose. Soldiers leaped, grabbing onto the gate, but Sisay kicked their hands away. They fell, and in moments, the lift rose out of their reach. It accelerated toward the city above.
"It'th no uthe," the guard captain laughed blearily. "They're going to exthecute your friend." He slowed down to speak more clearly. "They're going to bury him in the wall of garbage."
Tahngarth's eyes slitted. "Not if I can help it." With a roar, he flung himself from the soaring lift.
"No, Tahngarth!" Sisay shouted, extending her hand futilely after him. The lift was higher than he could have realized-a hundred feet and rising. As Sisay watched in horror, Tahngarth plunged toward ground. "Take us back down! Reverse, Hanna! Reverse!"
"I can't!" Hanna shouted. "It's hard wired now!"
"But Tahngarth!" Sisay shouted, staring down as his body shrank to a tiny point. Hands grasped her shoulders and pulled her back from the edge.
"Think of Gerrard!" Takara hissed as air rushed down over them. "If we can find the dump site, can stop them- we can save Gerrard."
Sisay collapsed atop her arms. "Yes. We can do nothing for Tahngarth. Think of Gerrard. Think of Gerrard."
Tahngarth had thought only of Gerrard when he flung himself from that lift. Now, he wished he'd thought of himself-and of basic physics.
Roughly speaking, every ten feet of a fall means another broken bone. This fall would leave Tahngarth with multiple contusions of legs, arms, spine, and skull. Those last two were the bad breaks. The shattered skull seemed almost a certainty since Tahngarth was flipping slowly over as he fell.
The marketplace spread out below him. Spectators crowded on either side of the road where Weatherlight rolled. Giants dragged the ship across logs and toward a huge door that gaped at the base of the mountain.
That was all Tahngarth saw before his face turned toward the spinning wall. Why had he thought of Gerrard? A few month ago, he couldn't stand the man, and now he would die for him?
Tahngarth somersaulted a second time. He glimpsed Gerrard's snow-white Jhovall marching amid a military escort. Gerrard was headed for the rubbish wall, for the section dug out to allow Weatherlight through. He would be buried there, in more rubbish.
Just before flipping to the wall again, Tahngarth saw a silver flash below-Karn? And what did he hold? A canvas tent roof?
Karn ran to the base of the lift shaft and hurled the canvas upward. The cloth's upper edge snagged on a lift bracket. Karn yanked on the lower edge, drawing it into a taut, beautiful, slanting slide.
Tahngarth struck the canvas slide-face first-and shot down the fabric slope. The rug burn on his nose was agony, but it was better than a skull spattering on stone. In whizzing moments, he ran full speed into Karn, who clutched the base of the slide.
There came a terrible chime sound that jarred minotaur and golem, both. The two tumbled to the ground side by side, their ears ringing.
That tone might have been bearable if it weren't accompanied by the roar of hundreds of booted feet converging around them. In moments, Tahngarth and Karn gazed at a ring of tridents and angry faces.
"I could slay twenty of them… before going down…" Tahngarth panted breathlessly.
Karn gave a shuddering sigh. "I couldn't dance with more than three."
Where were Hanna, Orim, and Takara? They talked a big talk about responsibility and all that, but then they get themselves lost. And look who was left holding the bag? Look who got to save the day time and again! Squee, that's who. He'd faced down the cateran enforcer that first day, and he'd been saving Gerrard and the others ever since. Today was a perfect example. He'd played his part perfectly. He'd saved the whole crew. But did anybody talk about Squee, giant killer? And why not? Did anybody ever One of the best-looking bugs in Mercadia scuttled along the gutter. Squee stooped to watch it wobble. The wobblers were the tastiest. They had the most meat under their shells.
"Come on, Squee! It's right up here! No time to waste!" Atalla said, yanking on his arm.
Now, there was an impatient lad-Atalla. Nice, but impatient. He'd also helped the crew escape twice now, which was plenty nice, but he'd gotten paid a thousand gold for it. Did anybody ever offer a thousand gold to Squee for anything in his whole stinking life? Maybe if he got impatient once in a while- "Come on!" Atalla said, bodily dragging Squee from the gutter.
For his part, Squee snatched the bug up and gobbled it down.
Atalla hauled him down a twisted lane to three huge wagons that stood side by side in stalls at the end of the road. Each wagon bore a massive bin brimming full of rubbish. Vegetable peels and hunks of splintered wood formed a slurry with broken plates and raw sewage. Above each of the bins swarmed ecstatic flies. Their tiny bodies jittered against the lemon sky. Just beyond the refuse wagons hung empty air-a drop of almost two miles straight down. Gerrard would be at the bottom of that drop, shackled and waiting to be slain by filth.
"Do you remember what you are supposed to say?" Atalla asked, shaking the goblin. "Do you remember?"
Squee tried to answer, but his mouth was full of bug. Clutching Squee's arm tightly, Atalla approached the giant workers that milled about behind the wagons. "You see, Master Squee? These are the brigands I told you about!" Atalla said dramatically, pointing at the lead giant. "Illegal dumping!"
Gray-faced and massive, the giant jutted his jaw downward and compressed his brow. Beneath putrid locks, his eyes gleamed in confusion. "Illegal dumping? Ain't no such thing!"
"It's new," Squee replied, and then hastily added, "ain't it?" The giant scratched a knobby torso. "We was told to bring this load of crap to this here street and dump it when we seen the flare."
"This-Here Street? This isn't This-Here Street." Atalla shook his head. "This street is That-There Street. Dumping's not allowed on That-There Street."
The giant shook his head, bedeviled. "This here street isn't This-Here Street?"
"No," Atalla affirmed. "This here street is That-There Street." He pointed to an adjacent road. "That there street is This-Here Street."
Gaping, the giant said, "I'll be damned."
"Is it not confusing?" Squee interjected.
"No-it is confusing," the giant replied.
"Don't it get more confusing with lots of street names?"
"I don't know what to say-"
"Don'tcha think we oughta call all streets by one name?"
"Now you're talking!"
"Wasn't Squee talking before?"
"Enough talking!" Atalla interrupted urgently. "By order of Master Squee, move these wagons to This-Here Street and prepare to dump them!"
"This here street, or This-Here-"
"Just do it!"
Gerrard, Tahngarth, and Karn knelt side by side in rubbish. Chains bound their wrists and necks and legs. To either side, a great wall of garbage rose. They would soon be part of that wall. Before and behind them stood whole regiments of men. Above it all, standing cockily atop the wall of filth, was none other than Xcric.