“I thought there would be no guards?” I hissed.
“Sorrail said there wouldn’t be,” said Renthrette, peering cautiously around one of the columns. “But there are only two, and they’re a lot smaller than the last one. The cell doors are right there.”
She unslung her bow and nocked an arrow.
“This is pretty much always your solution to difficulties, isn’t it?” I hissed again.
“What?”
“If in doubt, kill something.”
“Do you have a better idea?”
“I’m just saying your approach isn’t very, you know, inventive.”
“You take the one standing,” she answered. “I’ll take the one sitting at the table.”
“Take” was one of those little euphemistic expressions that she and her brother favored. It usually meant, as it did now, “kill.” Feeling that things were moving far too quickly for my liking, I swung my crossbow round and fiddled frantically with the cocking mechanism.
When she stepped out into the room, she did so with quiet ease and confidence, her bow already raised and the string drawn back. I scuttered after her and dropped to one knee. The standing goblin was in my sights before it knew we were there. It turned at the swish of Renthrette’s bow, but her arrow plunged into its comrade’s chest as it struggled to its feet. It barely had time to cry out before I fired and the bolt silenced it forever. Renthrette was already grabbing the keys and running to the cell doors calling Mithos’s name.
“Renthrette?” called a voice in answer. “Renthrette, listen, this is important!”
I was running over to join her, barely able to contain my delighted laughter, when there was a metallic sound behind me and I turned to find doors on either side of the arch we had come through, doors we hadn’t even seen, opening virtually simultaneously. A great goblin clad in dark, waxed leather and brandishing a huge scimitar was coming in through one door. There were others behind him. A pair of smaller goblins, their skin ochre and their limbs thin, had already come through the other, and there were darker, bigger forms following.
Renthrette drew and fired again, and one of the smaller creatures fell, holding its stomach. I took the keys and fumbled desperately at the lock, but the first key I could fit in would not turn at all. I turned to find the large goblin already bearing down on Renthrette, who had dropped her bow and drawn her sword. I thrust my crossbow head to the ground, braced it against my stomach, and leaned all my weight on it until the slide clicked into position. By the time I had fitted a bolt and swung the weapon around, Renthrette was almost surrounded, and several blows had been struck. I picked the nearest goblin, fired hurriedly, and, as it fell, drew my axe. One of them was closing on me and there was no way I was going to be able to get Mithos and Orgos, who were shouting our names wildly, out to help. The doors behind the archway continued to breed goblin forms. Renthrette parried a goblin slash and looked wildly round. For a moment our eyes met, and for once the feeling was mutuaclass="underline" This was not going well. In fact, it didn’t look like it would be going much further.
One of the goblins strayed close to me, leering through its narrow eyes. I cut at its legs with a savage sweep of my axe. The blow went wide and threw me off balance, and when I looked up, the goblin had edged cautiously closer, a slim spear aimed at my vitals. Renthrette was backing off, leaving her riven shield on the ground. One of the large black goblins had collapsed at her feet, bleeding, but another was advancing steadily, wielding a two-handed weapon that looked like an axe/sword hybrid, but bright and keen edged. She held her ground as the monster brought down its hacking strike. Her sword flashed up and parried, but as it did so, its blade shattered and fell in glittering shards.
“Run!” I shouted. “This way.”
There was nothing else for it. There was one way out of the chamber, since the enemy had blocked the way we had come, and that was out toward the other side, to the pass where we had been attacked the previous day. Barely waiting for her, I fled down a corridor of doors and tunnels, not knowing where I was going but running as if every devil in Hell was on my tail. For all I knew, that was exactly what was happening.
A black-flighted arrow whistled over my head and clattered against the wall, and I heard Renthrette’s bow gasp back its defiance. There was a cry of pain, harsh and loud as the bellow of a bull, but it was a token retaliation on our part. We knew we could not stand and fight. One of the doors ahead of me opened, and a goblin stepped out, curious about the commotion. I ran right into it and hacked at its neck once, barely breaking stride as it slipped to the ground, foaming blood.
Renthrette was immediately behind me now, but the pursuit had slowed. They were organizing themselves. If we were going to get out of here, we had to do something before they were on our heels again. I tried a door. It revealed a chamber full of shelves laden with pots, so I slammed it shut and moved on, trying the next: another storeroom. Then a third, and the sound of the door reverberated hollowly. It was dark inside, but I could hear the slosh and trickle of water: a great deal of water.
Renthrette grabbed a torch from the corridor, pushed me inside and pulled the door shut behind us. We stood on a rock platform in a huge square and high-ceilinged chamber cut out of the rock. The platform was only a few yards long. The rest of the room was filled with water.
“A cistern,” said Renthrette, looking quickly about her. “There must be a spring or something that brings in the water. Maybe we could use it to get out.”
“It’s probably under the surface,” I said. “Or it just seeps in through channels in the rock. Most of it is probably melted ice from the mountaintops.”
“Then why doesn’t it flood the whole fort?” Renthrette demanded.
“Good question. There must be some kind of overflow drain to stop the level from getting too high. Look around the edge.”
She paced the platform with her torch outstretched, peering into the water to see how deep it was. I did the same but could see nothing under the surface.
“Quick!” I said. “They’re coming!”
“There!” she said. “Over on the far wall.”
There, barely visible in the torchlight, was a small rectangle of darkness: a channel cut into the stone right at the water’s brim. My heart sank.
Renthrette jumped in without another thought. For a moment I thought she was standing on the bottom, but then she started to bob up and down as she treaded water, somehow managing to keep the head of the torch above the surface.
“Come on!” she hissed.
“I can’t swim!” I whined, awash with self-contempt and horror.
“Yes you can!”
“No. .” I began.
“You have to! Now get in! I’ll help you get across. It’s not far. Come on! They’re coming!”
I sat on the shelf and lowered my feet and legs into the still, freezing water. “I can’t!”
She reached over and tugged at my boots, pulling me in. I sank into the cold and silence, bobbing up a moment later, terrified and gasping for air. I began to go under again and she caught me, dragging me along as she began to swim.
“Hold the torch and kick!”
I tried, but my legs were too stricken with cold or the paralysis of fear to respond. All I could think about was the depth of water beneath me. Then the door into the cistern clicked and opened.
I pulled the torch underwater and it hissed briefly. Then all was dark and quiet, save at the door, where a pair of goblins stood framed in the flickering light of the corridor.
Renthrette’s hand slipped over my mouth and her legs began to kick silently. I let the torch go and began to move my arms and legs to her rhythm, my heart thumping. The goblins came in and looked around, but the chamber was pitch black and even their night eyes would have difficulty seeing us if we kept still.