It was not Winterhart—who was dressed in gold, and who was backing away from the assailant with her face frozen in a silent scream.
It was Silver Veil.
Every kestra’chern is taught self-defense, for every kestra’chern may one day require it, she had said once, when he’d expressed worry over her safety. Every kestra‘chern knows the body of man and woman, and knows where to strike if need be. He had smiled indulgently, then, and with a hint of disbelief. Those were the sort of things a warrior-trainer said to impress his Captain, and were usually of dubious worth. Now he believed!
The lovely kestra’chern whirled in a flurry of skirts, and kicked at the assassin’s legs, connecting with them expertly and bringing him down on his knees.
But the man was faster than Shalaman could have believed possible; he scrambled to his feet again, and as she tried a second kick, he caught her foot in one hand, then twisted in place and whirled, sending her crashing, gasping, to the ground in a tangle of silver fabric.
And once again, the assassin lunged toward Shalaman, this time unopposed.
Shalaman closed his eyes, the only parts of him that he could still move, and commended his soul to the gods.
At least I shall perish bravely, though I shall not perish as a warrior. Silver Veil, I shall never forget you—
The gods, however, decided that they did not want his soul—at least not right then.
A battle-screech rang out from overhead, and all heads searched the dim sky for its source. Even the assassin jumped, turned, and stared.
Out of the black sun-disk, out of the midnight-at-noon, the Gryphon King plunged with a scream of defiance that shattered the confusion and pierced the spell holding Shalaman captive.
Shalaman flung himself away from the assassin—and toward Silver Veil. The assassin frantically found the right direction—just in time to fling his paltry knife up in puny defense against ten razor-talons and the unstoppable force of a stooping predator.
Skandranon, the Black Gryphon, drove the assassin into the stone with a great crunch of breaking bone, sending the blade skittering away—
Just as the sun appeared again from behind the moon, frosting the great gryphon’s wings and glinting off his eyes.
The guards at last realized what was happening and started to rush up to the platform, but the Black Gryphon was not yet finished with his wonder-working. He gripped the assassin’s face with one clawed hand, made a savage gesture in the air with one talon of the other hand—
And the face of Amberdrake melted away, leaving an entirely unfamiliar—and rapidly bruising—stranger beneath the claws of the gryphon.
Shalaman straightened, still keeping himself between the assassin and Silver Veil. The stranger squealed and struggled, then shrieked with pain as his many freshly broken bones announced themselves to him.
Winterhart took a single look at the man and gasped in recognition.
She started to babble something at Shalaman, but in her distress she was speaking in her own tongue and he couldn’t make out a single hysterical word, so he waved at her to be silent. Skandranon mantled at the stranger, all but killing him with his glare. The crushed man soiled himself, unable to stop moving in his sobs of terror.
“Here is your murderer, King Shalaman,” Skandranon rumbled angrily. “Here is the man who slew your courtiers in ways not even a mad beast would contemplate, for the sake of collecting the magic power of death and blood, and who held both myself and Amberdrake captive so that his plan to murder you could be completed. He is an exile from among our own people, and I regret that we cast him out instead of finishing him then. We left it to the forest to dispose of a mad beast that we should have dealt with ourselves. He is the one who used his skill in killing to counterfeit the effects of magic, mimicking death-spells with death-skill. That was why it looked as if a mage had done the deeds.”
“If he is yours—” Shalaman began doubtfully.
Skandranon shook his head. “He is no more ‘ours’ than the garbage that we bury in the clean earth,” the gryphon replied. “We repudiated him and cast him out before we ever met your people. He is not ours, if you are offering him up to our judgment. He is as much yours as any mankilling beast who murders the innocent. He has committed crimes against you and yours, and you may do with him what you will.”
Shalaman took a long, steadying breath. “Then you turn him over to us, to be dealt with by our laws?”
Skandranon narrowed his eyes at the whimpering Hadanelith. “He should live so long.”
“Lies!” shrieked the captive suddenly. “It is all lies! They cast me out because I would not use my skills for their plans! They—”
“Silence!” Skandranon boomed, tightening his claws on the man’s throat until only a faint wheeze could be heard. Sweat stood out on the assassin’s pale forehead, and Shalaman might have been tempted to feel sorry for him, if the accusations against him had not been so terrible, and his guilt so sure.
But just to be certain, Shalaman looked to Leyuet, who shook his head. “I need not even trance, Serenity,” he said clearly, but with immense dignity. “It is this man who lies. His soul—I dare not touch it.” The Truthsayer was gray, and he shivered as if with a fever. “It is vile, filthy—as fully unclean as yours is pure.”
There were murmurs of fear and anger from those in the crowd who were near enough to hear, but no doubt—and those in the first ranks turned to spread the word back to the ones behind. The word passed rapidly as Shalaman waved to his guards to come forward.
The man began screaming again, but his words made no sense. “Noyoki, you bastard!” he howled. “Get me away! You promised! Get me away! Help me! Help me!”
Was there some rescue that was supposed to have taken place? If so, it appeared that this assassin had colleagues. But “Noyoki?” No one? What kind of a name was that?
“Your conspirators have deserted you, fool,” Shalaman said sternly to the struggling, screaming man. “Think of this, as you wait my justice.”
Where is Amberdrake? Could he be the reason that no one had rescued the assassin?
No time to think of that now. The guards dragged the assassin away, followed by two priests, hastily waved there by Palisar, who presumably would prevent any escapes by magic means. The assassin was screaming at the top of his lungs, but his words were no longer coherent.
Shalaman could and would deal with him later. What was important was the completion of the Ceremony.
Silver Veil had gathered herself back up again, although evidencing a limp, and was back in her place. The Gryphon King remained beside Winterhart on the platform. Shalaman turned again to face his people, resolutely putting Amberdrake and his fate out of his mind.
“By the grace of the gods and the strength of my friends, I have been spared to serve you!” he called out in a voice that would carry to the edges of the courtyard. “Here is the omen for changes—that Skandranon, the Gryphon King, once as White as his city, has come to my aid in the shape of a Black Gryphon King, and has struck down the murderer of our nobles with his own hands! What say you, my people? Shall we ally ourselves with these honorable folk of the north? Shall we add another Black King to the ranks of the Haighlei?”