“You brought this upon yourself when you refused to give the Oracle to the Joorsh,” Agis replied. “And I don’t see that you need me to open the gates.”
“Mag’r is no fool,” the bawan replied. “If he doesn’t see you, he’ll smell a trap and stay away.”
Agis sighed. “If I do this, will you at least send a detail of your own warriors to guard the lens? Perhaps they’ll even be lucky enough to kill Tithian.”
“And where am I supposed to get these warriors?” Nal demanded, waving his hand around the citadel. “The Castoffs that you unleashed have left me with nothing to defend the walls. The Joorsh could break through in a dozen places.”
What the bawan said was true. There were several gaps along the walls, with unconscious Saram slumped down behind the merlons, draped over rock carts, and even sprawled on the staircases. More than a dozen of the warriors who remained standing had been beset by Castoffs, and were tearing the hide from their own faces or banging their heads into the walls.
“If I didn’t need you to lure Mag’r into my trap, I would kill you now for the trouble you have caused,” said Nal, one golden eye fixed on a flock of nearby Castoffs.
“What you’ve done to them is wrong,” said Agis. “I’m glad they’re free.”
“Don’t be too glad,” said Nal. “One of the bawan’s duties is to protect his tribe from the Castoffs. Once this battle is over and I have time to gather them up, I’ll make their return to the pit as unpleasant for them as the Castoffs are making my warrior’s lives right now.”
With that, the bawan climbed down from the wall. He took Agis to the path leading down into the gateyard, stopping beside the huge stone ball at the top of the path. “After you open the gates, make sure that the Joorsh see you,” said Nal.
Agis eyed the scene below. The path had been carved into the cliff with a high lip on its outer side, so that it formed a deep channel down which the stone ball would roll. At the bottom of the steep slope, this gutter curved gently to the right and opened into the entry yard, directly across from the gates themselves.
Between the trench-path and the gates sat the small courtyard where most of the killing would take place. It was surrounded on all sides by the high walls of the outer curtain, the two gate towers, and the cliff upon which the noble and Bawan Nal now stood. A dozen ordinary Saram warriors crouched atop the gate towers, boulders heaped at their sides. The Poison Patrol manned the cliff top, ready to charge down the path as soon as they threw their cartloads of boulders down into the yard. Only the walls of the outer curtain were lightly manned, for any warriors there would be visible on the shores of Lybdos, and might cause Mag’r to grow suspicious of a trap.
In the courtyard itself, Nal had laid a pair of dead beastheads near the exit, where they would be seen by anyone entering the castle. Their purpose, Agis assumed, was to reassure the Joorsh that the gates had not been opened without a fight. The noble was about to comment on the bawan’s preparations when he noticed that the stonework around the gate was not up to the quality of the rest of the castle. The blocks were much smaller and fitted together less tightly, as if it had been necessary to rebuild the entryway and the task had been done in a hurry.
“You intend to capture Mag’r in the yard?” Agis asked.
“How perceptive,” Nal replied sarcastically.
“Then there’s a flaw in your plan,” the noble said, eyeing the huge stone at his side. “That ball will never stop when it hits the gateway. It’ll crash through the front wall like paper.”
“Probably,” replied the bawan. “But what makes you think I intend to loose the ball?”
“How else can you seal the gate after I open it?”
Nal put the noble down and gestured for him to descend the path. “You shall see soon enough,” he said. “Now go.”
Agis started down the trench path at a run, keeping his eyes fixed on the broken ground beneath his feet. When he had guided the dead bear up the lane, the surface had not seemed quite so uneven, perhaps because of the great size of the beast’s paws. To Agis’s feet, however, the loose rocks and enormous potholes were sizable obstacles, and he had to pick his footing carefully. As he ran, Joorsh boulders continued to pound the gate area, filling the pit with deafening booms and rumbles.
Whenever the path was smooth enough that Agis could lift his eyes without running the risk of breaking a leg, he searched the courtyard below for a place to hide. Once the Saram sprang their ambush, he knew, stones and lances would rain down into the pit with unimaginable ferocity. If he had not concealed himself in a safe place by then, it would hardly matter that he now knew where to look for the Oracle.
To his dismay, there were no doorways or arrow loops into which he could duck, no alcoves where the sentries had once gone to escape the blazing sun, not even any man-sized nooks or crannies in the stone blocks. The only place he could see that would be sheltered from the rain of boulders and lances was beneath the gate arch itself-which hardly seemed like a wise place to stand, given that it would be the Joorsh’s only escape route once the battle began.
The best chance of survival appeared to lie outside the citadel. After opening the gates, Agis would use the crossbar to prop them open, then wait on the other side of the walls. Once the ambush ended, picking his way back through the ranks of wounded Joorsh might be difficult-but not nearly as difficult as surviving a torrent of Saram boulders.
Upon reaching the bottom of the pit, the noble saw that Nal had thoughtfully left a spiked club propped against one wall. The weapon was just long enough for him to reach the gate’s crossbar, which hung several feet over his head. The noble picked up the cudgel and went to one end of the beam.
That was when he saw Brita, the chameleon-headed sentry who had challenged Fylo when they sneaked into the castle. She stood a few feet to one side of the gate, her skin exactly matching the color and texture of the red granite blocks from which the walls had been built. Only her body’s shadow, the fact that her breechcloth had not changed color with her skin, and the huge bone sword in her hand alerted him to her presence.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“Punishment, for letting a dead bear walk into Castle Feral,” she replied. The flange behind her wedge-shaped head flared in anger, then she added, “Now open the gate-and be sure to show yourself.”
Agis pushed the club up to the crossbar, groaning with effort as he lifted the heavy timber. The beam tilted toward the other side of the arch, finally sliding off its hooks and crashing to the ground. The noble tossed the war club aside and braced his hands against the gate. Slowly, he began to push.
The gate was about a quarter of the way open when a tremendous boom and a terrific shock ran through Agis’s body, knocking him away from the gate. He landed halfway across the yard, flat on his back and trembling in shock.
“Get up, coward!” hissed Brita. She had directed one of her conical eyes toward him and the other toward the gate. “You’re not hurt.”
Although he was not sure his aching bones agreed, Agis pushed himself back to his feet. The gate had been pushed shut again, and the head of a Shadow Viper harpoon was sticking through it. The weapon could only have come from the Joorsh ranks.
Agis closed his eyes, picturing Mag’r’s face and summoning the energy to use the Way. It was not an easy task, for he was still tired from his efforts in the crystal pit. In the short time since, he had recovered part of his strength, but far from all of it.
Once he had Mag’r’s puffy eyes and bloated cheeks securely in mind, Agis sent a thought message to him: What’s wrong? I thought you wanted us to open the gate for you.
My little spies? came the reply.
It’s Agis, the noble replied. Don’t let anything happen to our ship, or I’ll bar the gates again.