Blood and Betrayal (21 page)

The shaman stood straighter and flicked a long braid of auburn hair over his shoulder. “I am not your lackey. When I agreed to work with you, it was because you said she’d lead me to the assassin.” He pointed at Brynia, more specifically the oval device she still held. “The boy emperor has never wronged my people.
Sicarius
has.”

“I don’t care about your revenge dreams,” Mari said, not backing down from the shaman’s glower. You’re being paid for your assistance, and you’ll continue to give it. Besides, we thought the knife belonged to Sicarius and that he’d be with the emperor.” She tilted her head, as if some new thought had popped into it. “Perhaps this signifies that Sicarius died in the crash and that the emperor grabbed the knife, simply because he did not want to leave a valuable tool behind.” As she spoke those last words, she faced Maldynado. “What happened to the assassin?”

Maldynado ceased his manipulations of the rope. “No idea. He was too busy hunting down Forge people to come along with us.”

Brynia waved the oval device. “His knife was on that train and then on the dirigible.”

Mari tapped her chin. “Perhaps he
is
dead, and we’ve been worrying for nothing.”

“Think whatever you like,” Maldynado said. “Just know that your actions have condemned the Marblecrests as well as Forge. Sicarius never stopped working for the Savarsin family, and he’ll kill anyone who opposes Sespian.” Probably not, but it sounded like a good threat.

With a quick wave, Mari dismissed the shaman. She and Brynia started toward Maldynado. He grimaced. So far all his scraping at the bench had done nothing more than rub his skin raw. He needed more time. He needed—

Basilard sprang to his feet. He sprinted ten feet and bowled into an armed man before anyone reacted. The startled stillness from the guards didn’t last. A shot rang out from someone stationed by the window. Two guards by the door pushed the women behind potted trees for protection.

Maldynado flexed his arms, trying to muscle his bonds apart, but he hadn’t made enough headway on the cutting.

The guard closest to Maldynado raised his rifle, but by then his comrade was on the floor, entangled with Basilard. Instead of shooting, the man yanked a knife from his belt and sprinted toward the fray.

Maldynado judged his path, then hurled himself into a clumsy sideways roll. The guard saw him and tried to adjust, but it was too late. His foot caught on Maldynado’s hip, and he tumbled. The guard turned the fall into the roll of a practiced warrior, but his shoulder clipped one of the big, heavy pots, and his knife flew out of his grasp.

The blade clattered to the floor and skidded toward the bench. Before it stopped moving, Maldynado was rolling back toward it. He managed to grasp it, but, with his hands still behind his back, maneuvering it proved more awkward than sex in a closet. Nearly dislocating his shoulder, he slashed the rope securing his ankles to his wrists, but his limbs were still bound to each other, and cutting his hands free proved a tougher task. At least most of the guards were busy with Basilard who’d freed Yara as well.

Gunshots rang out, and Maldynado didn’t have time to feel indignant that he’d helped her first. He started to go for his ankles, but the guard who’d inadvertently provided the blade leaped to his feet. Though he’d lost his rifle in the fall, too, it only took him a split second to spot it. Maldynado saw it too. He hurled himself into another clumsy roll, angling toward the weapon. The knife blade sliced into his forearm, but he couldn’t slow down or worry about it. The guard sprang for the rifle. Maldynado reached it first and smothered it with his body. The guard pounced, landing on top of him.

With his wrists and ankles still bound, Maldynado couldn’t kick or punch. He did manage to get his knees up defensively. More by luck than design, he caught the fellow in the groin. Shock and pain contorted the guard’s face. Before he recovered, Maldynado whipped his head off the ground, smashing it into his assailant’s nose. With a buck that would have impressed an irate mule, Maldynado heaved the man off him.

Frustrated at being tied, and determined to get his hands in front of him where he could use the knife more effectively, Maldynado flung his bound wrists over his head. Something popped in his shoulder, and a wave of agony coursed down his arm. Too bad. Forcing the numb arm to move, he hacked at the rope tying his ankles together. Before he could flip the knife to cut his hands free, the guard leaped onto Maldynado from behind. An arm snaked around his neck. Maldynado ducked his chin, partially thwarting the lock before it started. A punch jabbed at his kidneys. Flexing his core to tighten his muscles and protect his insides, he doggedly kept at his ropes. The guard gave up on punches and used his free hand to try and gouge Maldynado in the eye.

“Go down, you fat-headed lizard,” the guard snarled.

Maldynado buried his chin deeper and squinted his eyes shut against the probing fingers. Finally, the last strand of rope snapped beneath the knife and his bonds fell free, leaving him the use of his hands. He dipped his shoulder and went down on one knee to throw the guard off his back. The man tried to stay on, but the weight shift tipped him to the side. It was enough. Maldynado had dropped the knife during the throw, but it didn’t matter. He grabbed his opponent with both hands and, with a roar of rage and pain, hurled him toward the wall. The guard smashed. Hard.

Maldynado snatched the knife and rifle from the ground, ready to shoot the eye-clawing bastard if he came back for more, but he didn’t move.

Gunfire boomed near the door. Maldynado darted around a large fountain, crouching behind its holding pool while he surveyed the situation.

Basilard had disarmed and downed the first man, but Maldynado didn’t see him amongst the proliferation of plants, trees, and water features. The sounds of a scuffle drifted from behind a potted hedge near the window though. Yara was kneeling behind a square planter hosting a lemon tree. She’d acquired a rifle and had it balanced on the pot’s lip, her finger on the trigger. Even as Maldynado watched, she fired at someone near the door.

A cry of pain rose over the sounds of running water and scuffling men.

“Retreat?” someone asked.

“Get the women out of here!”

Maldynado started to stand, thinking his comrades had the enemy on the run, but he spotted a guard creeping toward Yara, a pistol in his hand. Using the planters for cover, the man slipped from one to the next, creeping toward her. He stopped behind a pedestal sporting a bust of Emperor Raumesys and aimed the pistol at Yara’s back.

Maldynado fired his own purloined rifle without hesitation. He’d never shot one of the new weapons, but he couldn’t fault its accuracy. The bullet took the man in the side of the head, its force flinging him to the floor beside a fountain several feet away.

Yara’s head swiveled, and she gaped at the fallen man. When she met Maldynado’s eyes, he gave her a nod that was meant to imply that making the shot had been simple for someone as adept and capable as he. Unfortunately, he’d never advanced the rounds in one of the multi-cartridge guns before, and he fumbled the effort, dropping two bullets on the floor. So much for adept and capable. Yara had gone back to covering the door, so maybe she hadn’t noticed.

When Maldynado didn’t see any other guards near them, he darted from his fountain to her pot, sliding in beside her. She crouched barefoot, her brass-tipped slippers stuffed under the mulch of the lemon tree. Really! Maldynado was tempted to lecture her on the appropriate treatment of footwear, but she spoke first.

“Thanks for the help,” Yara said.

Pleased with the rare display of gratitude, Maldynado snuffed out his shoe concerns.

“You’re welcome, my lady.” From his new spot, Maldynado could see the door. One of the uniformed guards ran outside. A quick body count suggested he might have been the last enemy in the room. “We better get over there—”

“—before someone locks us in again, right.”

Yara led the way, rifle in hand as she stayed low and used the planters for cover. Maldynado took a second to smile, appreciating not only that she was finishing his sentences, but that she appeared quite competent as she advanced.

“Not now,” he told himself and crept after her.

Before they reached the doorway, Basilard stepped into view, a knife in each hand and two pistols jammed into his belt. Two unmoving men lay alongside the wall behind him.

“Good job, Bas,” Maldynado said and jogged through the doorway, ensuring he couldn’t be trapped in the Un-Relaxation Grotto again. He anticipated another round of opposition in the foyer, but the oak doors leading out of the castle stood open, letting a nippy breeze flow inside. “Did everyone flee?” Maldynado wondered.

Slaps sounded on the stone floor of an inner courtyard that opened up beyond the foyer. Since Maldynado hadn’t had a chance to see any of that area, he didn’t know what to expect, and he kept his rifle ready.

A white-haired, pot-bellied man with a towel wrapped around his waist padded into view, his wet sandals slapping against the floor as he walked. He spotted Maldynado, squealed, and dropped the towel. As naked as a newborn babe, he gaped at the group. Almost as surprised, Maldynado gaped back. For a startled moment, the man stood there, his arms and hands in the strange tableau of someone torn between grabbing a towel to cover himself up and simply running away from view. He chose the latter, and sprinted up a set of stairs faster than someone that age typically ran.

“I should have given him a card,” Maldynado muttered, touching a breast pocket and finding the business cards still tucked within. Apparently the guards hadn’t deemed them as dangerous as his rapier—or his
hat
, which was also missing.

“It looks like nobody bothered to inform the guests that there was a kidnapping going on,” Maldynado said when Basilard and Yara joined him.

“You’d think the gunfire would have implied something was amiss,” Yara said.

Perhaps the grotto is soundproof
, Basilard signed.

“So nobody will hear the screaming of the innocent outlaws the establishment is luring to their deaths?”

“Innocent?” Yara asked. “You’re about as innocent as a cat with cream smeared all over its whiskers.”

“Say, Basilard.” Maldynado gave him a thump. “Why’d you rescue her first and leave me tied up? Don’t tell me her insults have endeared her to you.” Or that you think she’s a more able fighter than I, Maldynado thought. That would sting.

I thought you could free yourself,
Basilard signed.
You’ve spoken often of exploits involving being tied up.

“There’s a difference between being tied to a bedpost by a hundred-pound woman and having one of those two-hundred-pound brutes trussing you up like the chicken going in the oven,” Maldynado said, waving at one of the fallen guards in view in the Grotto.

“I’m not sure what he said—” Yara pointed a thumb at Basilard, “—but, from your half of the conversation, it
sounds
like you’re whining again.”

Maldynado started to sigh—was this woman never going to recognize any of his finer qualities?—but he caught a slight smile on her lips. Hm. That was promising.

Basilard pointed at the doors leading outside.
We must go after the others.

Maldynado hadn’t seen his rapier, or his hat, anywhere and was tempted to run around the resort to find it, but Books and the others might need reinforcements sooner rather than later. He started for the castle exit, but halted a few feet from the threshold, one foot in the air. Four gleaming metal creatures had slithered out of the moat and shambled onto the other end of the bridge. The alligators they’d seen before.

“That could be a problem.” Maldynado put his foot down.

“We’ll see.” Yara raised her rifle to her shoulder.

“I don’t know if bullets will work.” Maldynado waved toward the bronze-and-iron hides. He’d seen real alligators on a trip to the Gulf, and they had been green and distinctly non-metallic.

Two of the creatures moseyed across the bridge, their red eyes locked onto Maldynado. He glimpsed an engraving on the top of one of the heads. Tar-Mech. He groaned. That cursed shaman was dead. When were they going to stop running into his creations?

“You see that, Basilard?” Maldynado eased backward a few steps. “Those are like the things we fought in that mine. The things that took explosives to kill.”

Basilard nodded grimly. He fired at the lead alligator as it stepped off the bridge. As suspected, the bullet bounced uselessly off the metal hide. The mechanical creatures didn’t move quickly, but the two in front would be in the foyer in a few more steps, regardless. Maldynado wouldn’t count on those jaws being plagued with the same slowness as the legs.

“All right,” Maldynado said, backing farther. “Explosives. Any idea where we can find explosives in a warrior-caste resort?” Books would probably be able to mix something up in the kitchen, but he wasn’t—”What are you doing?” Maldynado barked, his thoughts interrupted by Yara running toward the alligators.

She stopped at the threshold and grabbed one of the heavy oak doors.

“Oh, good idea.” Maldynado darted for the other door.

He expected it to be heavy, but not so heavy it wouldn’t move when he pulled. The shoulder he’d nearly dislocated earlier stabbed him with pain, and he gasped. He gritted his teeth and tugged harder. The door inched away from the wall. Too slow.

Maldynado was about to suggest running into the castle and letting the nude bathers deal with the alligators when the door gave way. Both doors did, snapping shut so quickly Maldynado almost lost his nose. Yara tumbled onto her backside. The doors slammed closed with a thump as one smashed into the lead alligator’s snout.

Basilard waved to a spot on the wall and signed,
Switch
.

“Steam-powered doors, right,” Maldynado said.

Thuds nearly drowned out his voice. The alligators ramming against the oak. At first, Maldynado didn’t think they’d have a chance at breaking in, but the wood planks shuddered under the assault. It sounded like all four constructs had started banging away.