Diminished by distance, she heard Turran's anguished, "But we couldn't have married our sister to an enemy!"
"We did!" Valther retorted. "I'd swear, now that I think about, nobody else could've gotten to the lists. Not and have gotten them to bin Yousif. Maybe we can hold his merry hanging after all."
"Damn!" Turran roared. Metal rattled as he smote the table. "Well, that's one. What about the other?"
"Grimnason," Valther said sadly.
"What? No! He's been our best man."
"A hunch."
"Ridyeh said blond."
"Hair can be dyed. It doesn't matter anyway. We're inundated by enemies, inside and out. We've been outmaneuvered all the way down the line. Which figures with a fox like Varthlokkur. So, after four hundred years, Ravenkrak falls, unvanquished by arms. Treachery's victim, as we always knew she would be. Hail the Empire."
Nepanthe had heard all she wanted. She ran.
Nepanthe rushed into the courtyard, looked around wildly, through the blinding snow barely discerned Ragnarson atop the wall. In a moment she was at his side, breathless. "Bragi, my brothers..."
"I know." He didn't turn. His gaze was fixed in the direction of bin Yousif's encampment. His expression was one of weariness and sorrow. "Mocker told me you wanted to leave. I don't know if we can, now. By stalling I may have cut all our throats. Haroun won't be happy. He isn't a forgiving man."
"You don't understand," she said. "The game's over. They know. Luxos brought proof. You've got to get out right now."
Ragnarson's shoulders slumped. He sighed. Turning, he replied, "Thank you, Lady. You'd better get your things. Don't bring more than you can carry. Clothes and food. My men are packing already. Can you make it down the mountain in this?"
"I guess so," she replied. "Be careful. They'll do something pretty soon." She left for the Bell Tower.
Ragnarson stood there for a while, staring down the mountain. One by one, as they were ready, his staff came to him. Rolf Preshka, Reskird Kildragon, Haaken on a litter borne by those two, Elana, and a handful of favored soldiers. Finally, he asked, "Where're Mocker and Nepanthe?"
No one knew.
"I don't like leaving the men," Kildragon complained.
In his new, tired voice, Ragnarson replied, "I loathe it. But would you rather be dead?"
Preshka observed, "We're not leaving any of our old people. Lif. Haas. Chotty..." He did the roll of old accomplices.
"Nevertheless," Reskird protested, "there's our reputation. .."
"Shut up!"
A figure plunged through the drifts in the court, shouted from the foot of the wall, "Captain, they're coming over the rear wall!"
Stunned, Ragnarson could ask only, "Who?"
"Bin Yousif's men, I think."
"How many?"
"Only a few so far, but more all the time."
"Right. Thank you. Rolf, send everybody back there. That'll distract them till we're out. Hurry."
Preshka departed.
"Elana, what about the costumes?"
"I hid them in the gatehouse."
"Good. Where the hell are Mocker and Nepanthe?"
"This must be them." Two dark shapes staggered from the direction of the Bell Tower. From beyond them came muted sounds of combat.
"May the Gods Above, or the Gods Below, or any
Powers here present, cast down, disperse, and render unto destruction the agents of destruction, the Storm Kings of Ravenkrak," Nepanthe said on arriving. "I prayed that at the beginning. Now it's being answered, and I wish I could take it back."
"All right, down to the gatehouse," Ragnarson ordered. Moments later, Kildragon held the guard at sword point while Elana recovered white robes sewn from bedsheets. Preshka returned and claimed his as Ragnarson ordered the gate opened.
A scream, above the growing clamor of battle (from the sound of it, the defense had the upper hand), echoed through the courtyard. Luxos burst from the door to the Lower Armories. "Move out!" Ragnarson growled. Though he had little doubt of the outcome of a duel with Luxos, having practiced with the man, he paused to engage while the others won free.
Ragnarson had learned his fencing in a less than chivalrous school. For him survival meant a lot more than fair play and an honorable death. As Luxos lunged, Bra-gi swept a hand through the icicles hanging from the tunnel-like gate, hurling them into his assailant's face. He followed up with a groin kick that propelled Luxos back amidst his brothers. Bragi fled only two steps behind his companions.
They took no more than a dozen steps. Then the slope came alive around them. Snowdrifts rose and became white-clad figures rushing the open gate. Ragnarson was hit, buffeted, knocked down, and trampled as bin Yousif's men swept past.
He fell cursing himself for believing that Haroun would go away without one last, cunning attack. He should have foreseen this...The first wave passed, ignoring his people. But the attackers cursing behind the falling snow, down the mountain, wouldn't be preoccupied with seizing a gate. Bragi knelt. He looked around, saw no one. His shout, drowned by the metallic racket behind him, brought no response. Wanting no attention, he kept his mouth shut from then on.
He stood, arranged his camouflage about him, continued down the mountain. Hopefully, the others would reach the place where they had agreed to meet if separated.
With a gasp of relief, Ragnarson dropped his end of the litter before Haroun's tent. His arms and shoulders ached. Beside him, wary, shivering spearmen relaxed only slightly as he dropped to his hams.
He had found Kildragon and Haaken in the lee of a snow-covered earthwork a quarter-mile below the gate. Kildragon had been trying to drag his friend down the mountain unaided, but had not been able to go further. The others had vanished, scattered by the charge. ... Then Haroun's troops had appeared and, apparently under special orders, had brought them here.
The flap of the tent whipped back. Lean, brown, clad in black, bin Yousif looked like a caricature of Death. "Send them in," he ordered.
Grunting, frowning down the length of spearshafts, Ragnarson lifted his end of the litter. A moment later the tent flap closed behind him. Warmth from a dozen braziers assailed him.
"He all right?"
Bin Yousif bent over Blackfang. Haaken mumbled, "Ready to take my turn carrying Reskird."
A smile, half feral, flashed across bin Yousif's face. "Fine." Turning, "Bragi, you're lucky you've got a good-looking, fast-talking wife. And that my men caught her first. I might not have given you a chance to talk."
Ragnarson had just noticed Elana crouched in a far corner, being intimate with a brazier. She offered a weary smile.
Bin Yousif continued, "Can't blame you for holding off. My problem is that I don't have a conscience. Well, it came out all right. No hard feelings. The old man's going to pay us off in Itaskia. Ah. Must be some more."
Ragnarson stepped to the flap with Haroun. Another prisoner, Rolf, had indeed arrived-but Bragi's attention wasn't caught by his lieutenant. Beyond and above
Preshka, through a slackening snowfall, vermillion flared and fluttered.
"Ravenkrak's burning," Haroun said. "Come in Rolf."
Ragnarson smote palm with fist. He felt worse each time he betrayed an employer. He was evil, a maggot. A man's oath had meant something once-but he had been a pup then, a fool in the fool's paradise of Trolledyngja.
"If you have to stare, go outside," bin Yousif growled. "Don't leave the flap open."