“He has to be out of the city. They may just be using his house as a base of operations.”
Taniel strode into the room, stopped beside Vlora, his eyes on his father. “If Westeven is in the city, he’ll move quickly. He could strike at any time.”
Tamas leaned back, taking in the information. General Westeven, the longtime retired captain of the Hielmen, was a legend. The man commanded respect from noble and commoner alike and had won battles across half the world. He was one of the few military men, foreign or domestic, that Tamas truly saw as an equal. And he was a king’s man through and through.
Tamas slid his dueling-pistols case across the desk to rest in front of him and began to load one. “Olem, eject anyone from this building that isn’t a member of the seventh brigade. Once the House of Nobles is secure, we’ll see about those barricades. General Westeven may be behind them.”
Olem left the room at a run.
The rest followed Tamas out into the hallway and down the stairs. Olem met them again on the second floor. The place was packed with people – city folk, peasants, poor merchants. It seemed like half the city filled the hallways. Olem had to push his way through to get to Tamas.
“Sir,” Olem said, “There are too many people in the building. It’ll take us hours to clear all the rooms.”
Tamas scowled. “Who are all these people?” A line had formed, and Tamas couldn’t see the front of it. He grabbed the closest man, an ironworker, by his thick overalls with the hammer stitched to one pocket. “What are you here for?”
The man trembled slightly. “Um, sorry, sir, I’m here to debate my new taxes.” He spread his hand toward the line. “We all are.”
“New taxes haven’t been issued,” Tamas said.
“For the king!”
A gunshot went off near Tamas’s ear and the man slumped to the ground before he’d been able to draw his dagger halfway. Vlora immediately began reloading her pistol. On Tamas’s other side, Taniel had drawn both of his.
The entire hall burst into motion. Cloaks and coats were discarded, and from beneath them weapons were drawn – swords, daggers, pistols – a few even had muskets. What had a moment before been an aimless line of city folk and commoners became an armed mob.
They fell on Tamas’s soldiers with the same shout: “For the king!”
Olem flung himself between the greater part of the crowd and Tamas. He fired a pistol and then drew his sword, cutting down three of the royalists in as many blinks of the eye. Tamas yanked his sword out and bellowed, “To me! Men of the seventh brigade, to me!”
Soldiers caught unawares were cut down. The hall was too crowded with the royalists, their trap sprung. But they weren’t expecting three powder mages or Olem’s trained ferocity.
“Back to the stairs, sir,” Olem yelled. “Up to the next floor!”
They cut their way toward the stairs in a fighting retreat. The royalists attacked en masse, trying to gain the advantage through numbers. Tamas stepped up beside Olem to hold them back while Vlora and Taniel fired their pistols from behind them. The staircase was soon full of the thick smoke from spent powder. Tamas breathed it in and savored it.
Gray-and-white uniforms emerged from the hall. Hielmen – what was left of Manhouch’s personal guard. There were twelve of them. They carried the best air rifles with bayonets fixed and charged forward without hesitation. These were not simple royalists. They were trained killers, notches even above Tamas’s best soldiers. They would not waver or retreat until they were dead.
The Hielmen carried air rifles, but the rest of the rabble did not. Tamas felt Vlora ignite a powder horn, and a man nearest the Hielmen exploded, showering the lot of them with gore and knocking two flat. Tamas reached out with his senses and ignited the powder in a man’s unshot musket. The unexpected blast blew the face off the woman next to him.
They made it up the stairs to the third floor, the Hielmen dogging their heels. They started up for the fourth floor when the popping sound of air rifles filled the air. It was a sound to chill a Marked’s blood, for a Marked knew that shot was meant for him.
Vlora stumbled on the stairs and fell. Taniel, farther up the stairs, leapt to her in an instant, sliding the ring bayonet over the end of his rifle and meeting the Hielmen’s charge with a silent snarl. His bayonet sliced a Hielman’s neck with the quick, easy motion of a trained butcher. He dodged to one side of a bayonet thrust and grappled with another Hielman. The man was a hand taller than him and at least three stone more. Taniel brought up the butt of his rifle in a blow savage enough to put the Hielman’s nose into his brain. The soldier dropped without a sound. Tamas felt a thrill watching his son fight. Taniel Two-Shot he might be, but he had the brutal hand-to-hand skills of an infantryman.
Taniel swung toward the four remaining Hielmen, ready to charge.
“Taniel!” Tamas barked, “Fall back!” He picked Vlora up. Deep in a powder trance, her body seemed to weigh nothing at all. She gritted her teeth against the pain. “Did it hit a bone?” Tamas asked.
She shook her head.
Tamas heard a pop and felt the bullet graze his left shoulder, missing Vlora’s head by inches. Tamas turned around only to look down the length of an air rifle, the bayonet coming toward his gut fast.
He transferred Vlora’s weight to one arm and drew his pistol and shot from the hip, dropping the Hielman dead from a bullet through the eye.
By the time Tamas reached the fifth floor, the last few Hielmen lay dead on the stairs. Tamas and his men assessed their wounds. Olem had a number of new cuts – they’d need stitching, but nothing more. Vlora’s shot had glanced off her thigh. She could handle pressure on it, so the bullet had not shattered the bone, and she’d be fine. Taniel had not been touched. His face was twisted in a savage grimace as he wiped gore from the end of his bayoneted rifle. At some point Ka-poel had joined them. The red-haired girl smelled of sulfur, and her hands were black. She wiped her hands on her buckskins and smiled at Tamas when she saw him looking.
Pistol shots and the sound of steel on steel faded on the floor below. Tamas took a few deep breaths, listening to Vlora’s heart beat. They both leaned against the wall, her head on his shoulder. He stepped away from her.
Footsteps echoed on the stairs below them. A moment later Sabon appeared. He had powder marks on the cuff of his jacket and a shallow sword gash along one arm. He breathed a quick sigh of relief on seeing them all together.
“Anyone hurt?” Sabon asked.
“Minor wounds,” Tamas said. “Where were you?”
“The officers’ mess. They came out of nowhere.”
“Casualties?” Tamas asked. Anyone important?
“A few,” Sabon said. He gave a slight shake of his head at the silent question. “From the looks of things it was mostly rabble. Took us by surprise, but once we’d rallied the men, it was barely a fight. All the Hielmen came straight for you.”
“Is the House secure?”
“Working on it.”
“Enemies captured?” Tamas asked.
“We’ve taken at least two dozen without a fight. Probably another forty wounded. They’re General Westeven’s men.”
“I know.” Tamas stepped over to his son and laid a hand on his shoulder. “Well done, Taniel.”
Taniel unfixed his bayonet and put it in its case. He shouldered his rifle. One glance to Vlora and then a stiff nod to Tamas. “Back to work, sir.”
Tamas watched his son descend the stairs, followed closely by the savage girl. He felt like he should say something else. He wasn’t sure what.
“Sabon.”
“Sir?”
“Alert Lady Winceslav. Tell her we need her soldiers in the city. General Westeven holds the barricades and I’ll be damned if I send my own men to their deaths against them. The mercenaries will need to start earning their pay. Prepare me a command base near the barricades. We take the fight to him. Vlora.” He paused, considering his decision for a moment. “Go with Sabon. I want you on my staff.”