Taking a firmer grip on the staff, he edged out of the alley and began to hobble down the irregular stone walk flanking the narrow street. The wind had picked up, out of the west, and the clouds had thickened, but no rain was falling.
As he made his way in the direction of the guard, Kharl was glad he had brought the staff.
The guard watched, bored, but cautious, as Kharl hobbled toward him.
Kharl halted, a good four cubits back from the man. “A copper, ser…a copper for a poor man…just a copper.” He leaned on the staff and took a step sideways, a step that brought him nearer to the brawny guard.
“Be on your way, fellow.” The guard turned, catlike.
“A copper…? Surely, you can spare a copper?” Kharl asked, as he took a step forward and paused. He could sense some of the white fog around the guard.
“Out of here!” The guard reached for his blade.
Kharl brought the staff up from below, a lesson he’d learned years before, and never forgotten.
The blade went flying. The guard gaped, but only for an instant before the iron-banded end of the staff slammed into his gut. As the man doubled over, Kharl used his two-handed grip to bring the other end into the man’s temple. The unseen whiteness around the guard vanished.
A rasping sound followed the collapse of the first guard. Then the gate burst open, and a second guard came charging out, his blade out, glistening in the flat light. Kharl brought the staff into his ready position, noting that the guard’s blade was more of a bronzed white than the silver gray he’d expected and seen on occasion when bravos had flashed theirs on the streets of Brysta.
As he struck with the longer staff, Kharl also wondered how the wizard’s guards could carry blades, since the wizard wasn’t a lord or a merchant. He supposed Lord West would either make an exception for a wizard or just look the other way.
The second guard parried Kharl’s first thrust, but had to back up from the force of the blow, dealt by a staff that felt more solid than mere wood. There was little enough space between the open gate and the wall, and Kharl slammed the staff into the guard’s knee. The man staggered, but tried to bring his blade around.
The move was too late, and Kharl hit hard enough that he could feel something snap in the man’s shoulder area. He didn’t wait, but struck again…and again.
Then he stood there, dumbly, for a moment, trying to catch his breath, as he looked at the two immobile forms on the stones.
After another series of gasping breaths, he lurched through the open gate and up the three steps onto a small porch just large enough to shelter three or four people from the rain while waiting for entry. He turned the antique brass lever handle, and the door opened.
Kharl was only halfway through the doorway when he heard hurried steps and saw a tall figure stop at the back of the wide, deep, and dim foyer. The ragged cooper could sense the cloud of that same unseen whiteness, and threw the staff up in front of him, even before the wizard flung a burst of whitish red fire at him.
The fire cascaded away from the staff-mostly. Some flame flared against Kharl’s left leg, but he kept the staff up as he took two steps forward, ignoring the searing pain.
Another firebolt flashed toward Kharl, running up his left arm, hotter than the coals of the forge, hot enough to bring up patches of flame on the ragged cloak.
Charging forward through the pain and the heat, and the smell of burned hair, Kharl thrust the ironbound staff right into the wizard’s midsection. For an instant, flame flew in all directions, but not at Kharl. The wizard’s mouth dropped open.
Before the wizard could recover, Kharl reversed the staff and tried to bring the other end against the other’s jaw and neck. While the blow was not terribly strong, it was enough to jar the wizard and allow Kharl to advance with another blow.
In moments, the wizard collapsed.
Kharl drove one end of the staff straight down into the center of his chest. Ribs and bones cracked, and the wizard went limp, lifeless.
Kharl stood there, stupidly, looking at the figure on the floor. The dark hair turned white. The smooth skin wrinkled, then turned whitish yellow, tightening around the skull. The hair became more wispy, then vanished, as a skull replaced the face that had been there moments before. Before Kharl could even swallow more than once, all that remained of the wizard were his garments and a pile of whitish dust that, in turn, began to vanish.
Kharl stepped past the clothes and to the first door on the left, polished oak that had aged into a deep gold, with dark grain lines. He opened the door gingerly. The chamber beyond, some sort of sitting room, was empty. Kharl closed the door and stepped past the archway to the dining area, also empty.
He hurried through the entire first level, but it was uninhabited, and he struggled up the stairs all too conscious of the growing pain in his arm and leg. Outside, thunder rumbled, and he could hear the patter of raindrops. He just wished that it had started to rain earlier.
In the first small bedchamber at the top of the wide and ancient oak stairs, Jeka lay on the bed, her eyes wide. One wrist was tied to the bedpost on the left side, and a coil of rope lay on a coverlet that was a dull green and so old that Kharl could not make out the pattern on the fabric. He moved around the bed, toward the side where Jeka’s hand was tied. Her eyes did not follow him, nor did she offer any sound or movement, still staring sightlessly at the ceiling.
He fumbled with the rope, trying to hurry, but finding the knot difficult with only one hand. Jeka did not move when he untied the one bound wrist.
Kharl doubted that he could carry Jeka and the staff, and he feared that if he touched her with it, she would collapse again.
“Stand up,” he ordered her quietly.
Jeka stood.
“Follow me.”
He hobbled down the stairs. Jeka followed, woodenly. Kharl didn’t even try to find a rear door. He just wanted them out of the dwelling as quickly as possible.
Outside, the wind was gusting, and scattered sheets of rain swept around them as they stepped out of the gate. Unlike the wizard’s, the bodies of the guards remained right where they had fallen.
“Murder! Someone’s murdered!” came a call from somewhere.
Kharl ignored that, too, and half trotted, half hobbled, not a counterfeited hobble, but one from the pain in his leg, toward the alley. Each step also stabbed through his left arm. There was no one in the alley, and another gust of wind blasted over them, rustling the graying leaves of the trees surrounding the ancient dwellings on both sides of the alley.
Kharl and Jeka managed three blocks before Kharl slowed to a true hobble, finally turning out of the last alley and onto Gemstone Road. Just after they turned the corner, they found themselves less than a rod from a Watchman on patrol.
“You!” snapped the Watchman. “What are you doing here?”
“Just a poor man, ser…a poor man…my boy, ser, he’s not right…ran off he did, and I’ve just gotten him…”
Truncheon in hand, the Watchman looked at Kharl, then at Jeka.
Jeka did not look at the Watchman, but remained standing beside Kharl.
“Does he speak, fellow?”
“Sometimes, ser…” Kharl looked at Jekat. “Can you tell the man your name, Jekat?”
“Jekat.” The two syllables were uninflected, dull, and she continued to look straight ahead.
The Watchman studied Jeka and then Kharl. He shook his head. “On your way! Away from decent folk. And make it quick!”
“Yes, ser…yes, ser…thank you, ser…” Kharl whined.
He just hoped that they didn’t run into more Watchmen or, worse, Egen, although he suspected the lord’s son might not even recognize him any longer. Not unless they held him and stripped him and found the scars on his back.
The rain began to fall more heavily, and by the time they were back in the serviceway beside the rendering wall, both Kharl and Jeka were soaked through. The rain had come too late to help Kharl with the wizard, but it might have helped them escape.