"All right, you filth," Drummond whispered, "every mother's son of you saw this bastard attack me. Now clear out quietly and take him with you before I clap everyone in the brig. Understand?"
They understood.
"Except Valentin," he added. "We'll send him around later."
Wide-eyed with fear, the Leaguers quietly made for the door, each escorted by a massive human and followed by a Bear. Only cycles later, a frightened-looking Valentin stood alone within the remaining coterie of Imperials, his cheek stubbornly turned toward the door. Outside in the formal gardens, the storm raged at its height, with rain pounding at the glass and trees bent nearly double. This close to the door, the muffled rumble of thunder could be heard clearly above the noise of the party.
"Wilf, Nik," Drummond called quietly. "I think you two should have the honor of inspecting this innocent Leaguer's face."
Brim stepped beside his old antagonist. "Turn around, Kirsh," he ordered coldly. "You know what I'm looking for. If you had nothing to do with my ordeal the other morning, then you go home free—with my apologies. Otherwise..."
"O-otherwise... what?" Valentin demanded, the whites of his eyes beginning to show again.
"Turn around," Brim repeated after a nimble of thunder that sounded like a distant barrage of disrupters. "We'll talk after I see the opposite side of your face."
Valentine cleared his throat nervously. "I don't have to," he sniffled. "If you so much as touch me, I shall complain to the Racing Committee that you..."
"Turn, Valentin," Brim persisted. "Nobody's threatening you—yet."
"B-bastard Carescrian," Valentin swore, his lips drawn tight against clenched teeth.
"Turn!" Brim's command was punctuated by a close-in lightning strike followed by its sharp report.
Valentin seemed to shrink into his black uniform, then—with a scowl of purest hate—he slowly revealed the opposite side of his face. Four welts of new, pink flesh extended well into his hairline from his jaw. The leftmost ran through an extensively remade ear.
Brim nodded. "Well, hab'thall," he said. "I'll bet that hurt, didn't it?"
Valentin only scowled defiantly. "I don't know what you're talking about," he snapped over windblown rain that drummed in sheets against the heavy crystal.
"Oh, I think you know." Brim snarled. "Nik, maybe you ought to see if these welts match your claws."
Ursis's eyes narrowed. "Yes," he agreed in a deep, angry voice, "perhaps I shall even reopen them to eliminate any possibility of mistakes." He smiled grimly, his fang gems gleaming in the candlelight. "Hearing you bleat again, Leaguer, would give me great pleasure."
"Flaring a hole in your stinking hide would give me great pleasure," Valentin hissed, drawing a sleek blaster from inside his tunic. Brim recognized it as one of the new Maranellos, ultrapowerful, rechargeable hand blasters that could burn holes in hullmetal plate. They were manufactured in Tarrott—and this one was equipped with a slender, crystalline silencer.
Ursis only laughed. "You wouldn't dare use that here, Valentin," he scoffed. "It may be silenced, but its flash would open all sorts of inquiries that neither you nor your filthy League can afford."
Valentin grimaced and slid the little blaster back into his tunic with a sullen look in his eyes.
"Hand that thing over before someone gets hurt, Valentin," Drummond growled. "Otherwise..."
Before he could finish his sentence, the Controller whirled and grabbed the handles of the crystal door. Unhappily—for him—his captors were much faster, blocking the heavy panel with their feet.
But as the two Imperials instinctively jumped to prevent his escape, they also provided a moment's opening to the next exit. Using the door itself as a springboard, Valentin catapulted himself past the two surprised guards and into the noisy crowd, with Brim, Ursis, and the rest of his would-be captors in hot pursuit—everyone moving at no more than a brisk walk, as if nothing out of the ordinary were taking place.
Valentine reached the ornate glass portal only moments before Brim, but the time was sufficient for his purposes. He was through the doorway and onto the rainswept balcony in plenty of time to scramble down an ornate column, then splash into the shadows of the formal gardens beyond with Brim and Drummond close behind.
"Stop, Valentin!" Brim shouted, nearly blinded by the teeming sheets of rain.
Halfway across the garden, the Leaguer slowed to fire a shot over his shoulder. It kicked up a welter of spray and debris through the puddles. Twice again, Valentin stopped to fire, missing both times. But Brim felt the second bolt of cold energy frost his face as he dove for cover.
After he fired his third shot, Valentin veered across a clear space, heading past a sort of maintenance shack, momentarily visible in flashes of lightning behind a stand of windbent crest oaks.
At the same moment, however, Drummond entered the picture, laying down bursts from a rapid-firing blast pike in the dirt around the fleeing Leaguer. "Halt, you bastard!" he yelled as he splashed along the path at full speed.
Whatever other plans the Leaguer might have had at that juncture, he changed them when the ground beneath him erupted in an absolute welter of sharp explosions. Immediately, he jinked left, zigzagged through the whirling debris, and dove headfirst through the open door of the shack.
Running hard behind, Brim straightaway saw a blaster flash three times from the shack's window.
He dove to the ground behind a flower display, blood trickling from his cheek where a flying crockery chip had hit.
"Amazing what a few bursts from the old Trenning here can do," Drummond laughed, splashing down beside Brim and patting a great blast pike he held in his hands.
"Sure changed old Valentin's mind about running any farther," Brim answered over a deafening burst of thunder. "Now, all we've got to do is get him out of there." He raised himself carefully and peered over the flower bed. "Valentin!" he shouted above the tumult of the storm, watching the dark figures of security agents move in to surround the shed. "You're trapped, and you xaxtdamned well know it. Throw that blaster out now and you'll need face only me."