"Not desert. Escape. He feels trapped."
"Aren't we all? But it'll be over come winter."
"Don't be dense!" Elana snapped, harsher than she intended. "You're the reason he feels trapped. After getting nowhere for so long, he'd rather run and forget. Why should he beat his head against a wall?"
"But you know the trouble I have even talking about that..."
"That isn't the problem. It's the other barriers you put up."
"Like what?"
"So many things. Your opinion of yourself, for one thing. You think you're not good enough for him. So you put him off. And then there's the things you talk about doing when the war's over. They aren't very realistic. But you hang on to them to keep the real world from getting to you. Only ydu keep Saltimbanco out too. And being moody all the time doesn't help."
"You're harsh, Astrid."
"Now the hurt puppy look? What'll move you? Everybody's been patient so long. If a beating would help, I'd tell Rendel to give you one. For your own good. Nepanthe, we're talking about a man whose whole life revolves around you. You're killing him and you don't much seem to care. In fact, you're doing everything you can to make him more miserable. Yet you say you love him! Look, you're both twenty-nine. That's a lot of lost years. You can't make those up. And you want to throw the rest away? Grow up, Nepanthe! Wake up! You're wasting something precious."
"But..."
"You always have an excuse, don't you? Think about this. Ten years from now, when you're sitting here in your tower, what will your past be? A wasteland as barren as these mountains?"
"Astrid..."
"I don't want to hear it! I haven't got time. I'm going down to my husband. He's real. You're about to make a nail-biter out of me, too."
"Astrid..."
But Elana left, ignoring her plea. Nepanthe slumped, entered her sitting room, strode to her fireplace. After a moment, she snatched a figurine off the mantel, hurled it across the room.
The crash brought the maid. She found Nepanthe attacking her embroidery with a dagger.
Elana stamped across the courtyard, still fuming.
Valther burst from the tower where old Birdman kept his pigeons. He was pale, stricken.
"Is Nepanthe in the Bell Tower?"
She nodded. As he ran past, he shouted, "Get your husband, and Saltimbanco if you see him, down to the Lower Armories. Fast!" He vanished into the Bell Tower.
Something had happened. What? Then she remembered that Bragi was in the Lower Armories talking to Haaken. The game could be up if they were overheard.
Minutes later she hurtled through a door, gasped, "Something's happened. Valther's running around screaming, collecting everybody for a meeting in the sorcery chamber. Bragi, you're supposed to be there."
Ragnarson froze, thought. "Kildragon." He indicated his brother. "Gag him and hide him. Stick with him. Everybody else, down to the Deep Dungeons. Play 'visit the wounded.' Elana, where's Mocker?"
"I saw him a little while ago, but I don't know where he is now. He's got it bad. Nepanthe isn't helping."
"Sometimes he goes up where the back walls meet and just stares into the canyon," said Kildragon, knotting the gag behind Blacklang's head. 'That's where he'll be if he wants to think. It's the loneliest place in Ravenkrak."
"All right, let's get," Ragnarson growled.
Ten minutes later, exhausted, Elana reached the top of one of the short rear walls. A few yards away, staring into the canyon behind the Candareen, were Jerrad and Saltimbanco. They passed a wineskin while grumbling to one another. Silence greeted her approach.
"Something's happened," she said. "Valther wants you in the Lower Armories."
"What is it now?" Jerrad demanded.
Saltimbanco said nothing. After a glance at Elana, he turned back to the canyon... What? What was that? Up the face of that impossible cliff? So! He turned, threw his arm across Jerrad's shoulder. "Come, old friend. We make them happy, eh? But we take this wine, too. Make us happy, too. Hai! We raise some hell at meeting, eh? Good! We go."
The others were waiting when they arrived. Jerrad took his usual seat. Saltimbanco assumed Ridyeh's, saying, "Old plan of fat rascal big failure, eh? New intrigue for finding spy? Maybe still chance for same to be here?"
"Don't sit there!" Valther snapped. "Take a chair off the wall."
Eyebrows rose. Valther hadn't yet divulged his secret. He did so once Saltimbanco settled himself.
"I just picked up a message from Luxos. He used his last pigeon to send it..." He paused. Sorrow and anger fought for control of his face. "Ridyeh's dead!" It was almost a scream.
"What?"
"How?"
"Are you sure?"
Ragnarson and Saltimbanco sat quietly, unsure what to say or do. The operation had just turned nasty. A member of the family had been killed. Their treachery could be pardoned no longer.
"Shut up!" Valther bellowed into the clamor. "All I know is that he was murdered two weeks ago by one of bin Yousif's assassins. Luxos says he was onto something. He went to buy information and never came back. They found him floating in the Silverbind, tied wrist to wrist with the informer. They'd both been knifed. Luxos says he's coming home before he gets the same."
Into the stillness that followed, Turran interjected, "All right, it's no game anymore. We've got a debt to repay now."
"When do we kill Itaskia?" Brock asked. He made it sound like a simple, unarguable balancing of the scales: a city for a brother.
"No, we can't do that," Valther growled. "We can't afford any more enemies. And it's not Itaskia's fault anyway. Bin Yousif did it."
"Bin Yousif is a damned Itaskian War Ministry client," Brock countered. "He's their hole card against El Murid and Lord Greyfells both. Anything he does, you can bet the Ministry is in it up to their necks."
"Damn it!" Nepanthe cried. "Can't we break this siege?"
"No," said Turran. "We don't have the strength. I can't ask Rendel to commit suicide. What's that got to do with it, anyhow?"
Nothing. She was looking for a path of escape from other problems.
One of Ragnarson's mercenaries burst in, put an abrupt end to the meeting. "Captain, they're comin'!"
"Sound the alarm, lithe."
"Been ringin' a couple minutes. The companies are on station. The cats and ballisters are firin'."
"Well, let's have a look." He rose.
"Get moving!" Turran thundered. "The walls!"
When Ragnarson reached the main courtyard he found it a-riot with hurrying men and women. There seemed no apparent purpose to their motion, yet it was without panic, and quickly sorted itself out. The hurry had, in fact, been drilled in during long training, as support for those on the walls. There, men plied bows and served heavy weapons with cool efficiency. The women handed up fresh ammunition. A storm of death fled the battlements.
Ragnarson reached the command post atop the gate tower, quickly surveyed bin Yousif's assault. Haroun had brought up ladders and grapnels, but his attack teams were retreating already. Just a probe. Had Haroun found a weak point? Would he exploit it before Turran finished doing his sums and cleansed his castle? Ragnarson knew he didn't have much time to get Haaken's information. His margin was getting damned narrow. Self-preservation demanded that he plant his feet firmly somewhere, soon.
"Congratulations," said Turran. "Your drills paid off."
"He wasn't serious, just probing. Will you excuse me?" Awaiting no answer, he hurried down to Haaken's hiding place. "The gag!" he snapped on entering. Kildragon removed it. "Well, Haaken, you remembered anything?"
"Yes," Blackfang grumbled. "There was this old codger who looked like he was in charge. I figured to put him in the ground when the odds looked right. So when he wanders off by himself, I go after him. I swear, I never made a sound, but when I'm ten feet away, he jumps around, points a finger, and the next thing I know for sure Elana's waking me up. Bragi, he was some sort of spook-pusher."