A few paces to his left was the stable door. He headed that way, only to step ankle-deep in a foulsmelling puddle that he had not seen in the dark. The cold water thoroughly soaked the rags he had bound on in lieu of boots, and he wished again he knew some appropriate curse for such occasions. He started to step back out of the water, then changed his mind and strode on; what more could happen?
He promptly cut his newly healed left foot on some sharp object under the even black surface of the water. Growling angrily, he marched on, and emerged without further hurt on the stable threshold. Peering inside, he could see nothing at all, but his hand on the doorframe encountered a tether. He pulled at it, and was answered with the bleating of a goat.
Now it merely remained to get the goats to Koros, then to find and retrieve the basilisk. Dragging the reluctant goats, he marched off westward.
It was well after midnight, and the streets were, as far as the overman could see, utterly deserted. He maintained his stoop and the concealment of his hood, which in any case kept off some of the rain, but decided against struggling through the murky sidestreets, risking losing himself again. He had just concluded that even the high road west from the village square would be safe, and clearly the best and fastest route, as he passed the dark doorway of the King's Inn, when someone stepped from the middle alley of the three that met the one he was in, scarcely a dozen yards away. The dim glow from the few remaining illuminated windows glinted yellowly from his shoulder, and Garth realized the man wore mail-it was one of the Baron's men-at-arms.
It was only common sense, after all, for the Baron to post a guard on the inn. Garth silently reprimanded himself for not expecting it. It was too late to hide; the soldier had seen him. He kept on walking, dragging the goats, as if the man's presence were of no importance to him.
"Ho, there!"
Garth stopped short. He paused a second before replying, glancing about as if to be certain he was the one addressed.
"Yes?" He pitched his voice an octave above its natural range.
"What are you doing here?"
"I'm going home."
"Where's that?"
"West of town."
"Where did you get those goats?"
"Bought them."
"At midnight?"
"This afternoon. I stopped for a drink or two, that's all."
"Well, old man, I know they're stolen as well as you do. But I have orders to stay here and guard this pesthole of an inn. Maybe I could forget I saw you." As the conversation had proceeded both parties had kept moving, so that they were now only a few feet apart from one another, Garth keeping his head low so that all he could see of the soldier was his feet. He didn't see the guard's outstretched palm, but he caught the meaning of his remarks. The man wanted a bribe.
"I have no money, sir, else I'd pay you for your kindness." He tried to make his voice shake as he said that, but the attempt sounded unnatural at best.
The soldier peered at the bent, cloaked figure that still stood as tall as himself, and decided that he wasn't going to get any money without a fight. Annoyed, he ordered, "Well, be off with you, you and your damned goats. And take the rain with you." He turned, disgruntled, and splashed off to his lurkingplace in the middle alley.
Trying to sound like any fawning peasant, Garth said, "Yes, sir, and thank you, thank you very much, and bless you, and may the gods keep you safe." He sloshed onward through the puddles, dragging his reluctant goats but being careful not to display too plainly his superhuman strength. It was only when he was well past the center alley, in fact at the corner of the westernmost alley near where he had waited before entering the tavern, that he dared to halt and abandon his role of an elderly human. Growling, he peered through the rain but could see nothing. He doubted that the small, pale eyes of humans were as good as his own blood-red ones, and therefore concluded that if he could see no one, no one could see him. He stood straight long enough to ease a little of the ache in his mistreated back, gave a jerk that sent the goats tumbling and bleating, then resumed his crouch more to keep his face dry than to maintain his faзade and marched off through the black and dripping streets.
He made the rest of his journey without incident, looping through the noisome side streets until at last he emerged onto the west road, then making excellent time on that relatively wide, straight and well-drained street. The goats gave up fighting his superior strength, and in fact hurried on willingly, apparently hoping that the overman would get them in out of the rain.
Even though there were no further delays other than the poor footing and visibility caused by the rain, Garth knew that only three hours remained before dawn when he finally found himself looking at the distinctive ruined wall that surrounded his chosen cellar. Since he hoped to slip into the baronial mansion before sunrise, he was hurried and impatient. He called out for Koros while still a dozen yards away.
There was no response.
Oh, well, Garth told himself, the beast must be asleep. He trudged on, leading the goats, which were beginning to show some signs of reluctance. Perhaps they had caught the scent of warbeast.
Splashing through a puddle, Garth rounded a broken wall and peered into the darkness of the basement where he had left Koros. He was unable to distinguish a thing. Here he had no scattered light from the village windows, and the moon and stars were hidden by the clouds. The only light was a dim luminescence that seemed to come from the clouds themselves.
It was hardly surprising that he could not see a black animal, no matter how large, in a pitch-dark hole. He wished he had some means of making a light, but there was nothing around not far too wet to catch a spark from his flint. He called again, to be answered only by the very faintest of echoes. As he continued to look downward, away from the pale glimmer of the sky, he had the impression that his eyes were adjusting to this more absolute darkness, yet the cellar continued to appear a smooth black. It seemed somehow unnatural; suddenly apprehensive, Garth groped for a chip of rubble and tossed it into the cellar, listening for the click of the pebble on the stone floor he had cleared that afternoon.
Instead, he heard a small "ploosh" as the shard struck smooth water, and he realized why he had been apprehensive. His senses, either sight or sound, had detected the fall of rain on water rather than pavement, though he had not immediately realized it. Though the storm had trailed off to little more than a drizzling mist, it was still there. However, Koros wasn't.
The warbeast was more tolerant of water than its feline ancestors, and fully as obedient as one could reasonably expect, but it would scarcely stay in a hole flooded well over a foot deep. Garth crouched, thoughtfully, as he tried to guess where the creature would have gone upon deciding to abandon the place it had been ordered to stay.
It seemed to him that it would do one of four things: it would seek out its master for further instructions; it would go hunting, as it had not been fed for a day or two; it would go home, either to Ordunin or, if its memory was long enough, to Kirpa; or it would merely seek shelter, a dry place where it could wait out the storm. And in any of those four cases, it might eventually return to await Garth.
If it had gone seeking Garth, it might even now be lost in the village, wandering the empty streets in search of him. That could be very bad, but there was nothing Garth could do about it. If it had gone home, well, it was gone. Likewise, if it was hunting, it would come back in its own time and not before, and there was no way Garth could find it. He might search the area on the chance that it merely sought shelter and found some nearby, but the overman did not feel that it would be wise to waste the time. Instead he would leave the goats here, and hurry back to Skelleth after the basilisk. When he had delivered the monster to the Forgotten King there would be time enough to find Koros. The only thing he regretted was that he had left his supplies in the cellar, where they undoubtedly remained somewhere under the dark rainwater. He did not care to venture down there after them.