City of Sorcery (25 page)

“Only one thing’s sure,” Cholayna said, “we weren’t drugged out of rustic kindness, to give us a good night’s sleep. Let’s stop talking and see if we can wake up the others. Magda - do you know Jaelle’s endorphin type?”

“Her what?”

“You don’t, then,” Cholayna said in resignation.

Camilla was shaking Jaelle, furiously but fruitlessly. Jaelle fought and mumbled, opened her eyes but stared without seeing, and finally Camilla hauled her and her sleeping bag into a corner.

“She might as well be in Hermit’s Cave on Nevarsin Peak, for all the good she’d be in a fight right now!”

“It’s just luck we’re not
all
in the same state.”

“Cholayna,” Camilla said, “if I ever say one more word about your chosen diet, ever again, kick me. Hard. Can we get Vanessa part way awake?”

“I can’t,” Cholayna said.

“Could she fight, anyway, with her ankle the way it is?” Magda asked.

“Well, it’s up to us,” Camilla said. “Let’s try and move her where she won’t be hurt if it comes to fighting. No, Margali, not you, sit down a minute longer while you can. You know you’re as white as a glacier?”

Cholayna shoved Magda down on the packload where Camilla had slept, and together they hauled Vanessa out of the way behind the stacked loads.

“Are there bolts on the doors that we can draw? It might slow them down a little.”

“I checked that even before we had dinner,” Camilla said. “No wonder they have us in a barn instead of an inn. No one expects to be able to make a barn secure.”

“Do you think the whole village is in on this?”

“Who knows? Most of them, probably. I’ve heard about robbers’ villages,” Camilla said, “but I thought it was a folk tale.” They were all speaking in strained whispers. Camilla went to the main door and opened it a crack, cautiously peering out. The wind and snow tore into the room like a live animal prowling; the door almost got away from her and she had to manhandle it shut with all her strength.

“Still snowing and blowing. What hour of night
is
this?”

“God knows,” Cholayna said, “I don’t have my chronometer. Magda warned me not to bring any item obviously of Terran manufacture that isn’t openly sold in Thendara or Caer Donn.”

“It can’t be very late,” Magda said, “I hadn’t been fast asleep at all. Not more than an hour can have gone by since we turned in. I should think they’ll wait a while longer to be sure.”

“Depends on what drug they gave us, and how long it takes to do whatever it does, and how long it lasts,” said Camilla. “We might want to keep half an eye on Shaya and Vanessa, just in case they start choking to death.” Magda shuddered at the matter of factness of Camilla’s voice as she went on, “If it’s fast acting and short-lived, they’ll be here any minute. If we’re really lucky, they’ll trust it completely and send one man to cut our throats, and we can arrange something else.”

She made a grim, final gesture with her knife. “Then, while they’re waiting for him to come back and give the signal to pile up the loot, we high-tail it out of here. But if we’re not lucky, the whole village could come in with hammers and pitchforks.” She strode to the concealed entrance where Calisu’ had come in to give her message. The wind was not so high here, but still it tore through the room. Camilla looked out into the blowing snow, and drew a harsh gasp of consternation; Magda expected her to slam the door shut, but instead she darted out and, after a moment, beckoned.

“Here’s the answer to one question,” she said grimly, and pointed.

Already covered by a layer of drifted snow, the woman Calisu’ lay on the ground, her dead eyes staring at the storm. Her throat had been cut from ear to ear.

Camilla slammed the door and swore. “I hope the headman’s wife goes into labor tomorrow with an obstructed transverse birth! Poor damned woman, they may have thought she warned us!”

“Are we going to leave her body lying there?”

“Got to,” Camilla said. “If they find it gone, they’ll know we
are
warned. Hellfire, Magda, you think it matters to her anymore where her body lies?”

“Do you think it’s early enough that we could simply escape - sneak out of here before they come?” Cholayna suggested.

“Not a chance, not with Jaelle and Vanessa still dead to the world. One chervine bleat and they’d be on us. They’re probably sitting around in that inn they told us didn’t exist, whetting their knives,” Camilla said gloomily. She stood with her hands on her hips, scowling, thinking it over. “Stack all the loads against the back door - ” She pointed. “Slow them down. We’ll be ready for them at the front. Magda, are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” Whether it was Cholayna’s stimulant or the adrenalin of danger, Magda had no idea, but she felt almost agreeably braced at the thought of a fight. Camilla had her knife out. Magda made sure that her dagger was loose in its sheath. It had been a long time since she had faced any human enemy, but she felt it would be a good and praiseworthy deed to kill whoever had cut the throat of the harmless midwife.

She began to help Cholayna stack the loads, but Cholayna stopped. “I have a better idea. Get the loads
on
the animals. Have them all backed up against that door. Then, when they come at us, if Jaelle and Vanessa are awake by then, we can ride out right over them! If not - we can get free, as soon as the first attackers are out of the way.”

“Not much hope of that,” Camilla said, “but you’re right; we have to be able to get the hell out of here without stopping, to load and saddle up the animals. We’ll do that, but keep an eye on that front door, because that’s where they’ll come.”

“Stack up a few loads against it,” Magda suggested.

“No, they’ll know we’re warned then, and come at us with knives ready. If they come in here thinking we’re all asleep and ready for the slaughter, we can get the first couple of them before they have much of a chance at us. Anything that shortens the odds against us is fair under these circumstances.”

Camilla started hoisting loads onto chervines, while Magda saddled her pony and Jaelle’s. Cholayna went to help Camilla with the packloads, taking away everything before the door, and Magda knew, with a shiver down her spine, that Camilla was clearing the space for a fight. She had seen Camilla fight; had fought once at her side… Her head still throbbed faintly, but otherwise everything seemed blindingly lucid, everything she saw sharp-edged and fresh. She started to put a saddle on Camilla’s horse, realized it was Vanessa’s saddle which was larger, and made the exchange, saying to herself,
I’ll be saddling up chervines next if I’m not careful
.

The horses were saddled; the pack animals loaded.
If they do kill us, at least they’ll have some trouble getting at our stuff
, she thought, and wondered why she thought that it mattered.

Camilla hunkered down where she could face the door, her fingers just resting on her sword. The Renunciate charter provided that no
Comhi’ letziis
might wear a sword, only the long Amazon knife, by law three inches shorter than an ordinary sword; but Camilla, who had lived for years as a male mercenary, wore the sword she had worn as a man, and no one had ever challenged her.

She grinned at Magda. “Remember the day we fought Shann’s men, and I said you had dishonored your sword?”

“Will I ever forget?”

“Fight as well as that and I’m not afraid of any bandit in the Kilghard Hills.”

Cholayna, half-smiling, leaned against the wall nearby. “Do you hear something?” she asked suddenly.

Silence, except for the high whistle of the blowing snow and wind roaring around the eaves of the building. Some small animal rustled in the straw. After the frantic activity of the last few minutes, Magda felt let down, her heart bumping and pounding, the metallic taste of tear in her mouth.

Time crawled by. Magda had no idea whether it was an hour, ten minutes, half the night. Time had lost its meaning.

“Damn them, why don’t they come?” Cholayna’s voice came tight through her teeth.

Camilla muttered, “They may be waiting till we put out that last light. But Zandru whip me with scorpions if I’m going to fight in the dark, and if we have to wait till morning, so be it. I’d just as soon they never came at all.”

Magda wished that if there was going to be a fight, it would come and be over with; but at the same time, she was remembering in sharp-edged detail her first fight, feeling the appalling pain of the sword slicing along her thigh and laying it open. She was, quite simply, terrified.

Camilla looked so calm, as if she actually relished the notion of a good fight.

Maybe she does. She earned a living as a mercenary for God-knows-how-many-years
!

Then, in the silence, she heard Cholayna’s breath hiss inward, and the Terran woman pointed at the door.

Slowly, it was pushing inward, the wind howling around the edges. A face peered around the edge; a round, scarred, sneering face. Immediately the bandit saw the light, the cleared space and the women awaiting him, but even as his mouth opened to give a warning yell, Cholayna leaped in a
vaido
kick, and his face burst, exploding blood; he fell and lay still.

Camilla bent to drag the man, unconscious or a corpse, out of the way; another bandit rushed in after him, and she ran him through expertly. He fell, with a short hoarse howl. The man who pushed in after him got his neck broken by a swift slam of Magda’s hand.

“You haven’t forgotten
everything
, anyway,” Cholayna whispered approvingly.

There was a lull, and then the man whose belly Camilla had split groaned and began screaming again. Magda cringed at the terrible cries, but did nothing. He had been ready to cut all their throats as they slept. She owed him no pity; but as Camilla stepped toward him, her knife raised to silence him once for all, he fell back again with a gurgle, and the barn was almost silent again.

There are certainly more of them out there
, thought Magda,
sooner or later they’ll rush us all at once
. They had been lucky: Magda had killed her man, and the one Cholayna had kicked, though possibly not dead, had at least had all the fight knocked out of him…

The door burst open, and the room filled with men, yelling like so many demons. Camilla ran the nearest one through, and Magda found herself fighting with her knife at close quarters. Cholayna was in the center of a cluster of them, fighting like some legendary devil or hero, kicking with frequently deadly accuracy. Magda’s next opponent ran in over her dagger and drove her backward, off-balance; she felt his knife slice into her arm and kicked out wildly, then slammed her other elbow into the base of his throat and sent him flying aside, unconscious. She could feel hot blood trickling down her arm, but another bandit was on her already, and there was no time for pain or fear.

One of them, running toward the horses, literally stumbled over Jaelle; he bent swiftly with his dagger, and Magda flung herself on him from behind, shrieking a warning. She pulled her knife across his throat with a strength she had never imagined having, and he fell, half-beheaded, across Jaelle - who woke, staring and mumbling uncomprehendingly.

As quickly as that, it was all over. Seven men lay dead or unconscious on the floor. The rest had retreated, possibly to regroup, Magda did not know which or, at the moment, care.

Jaelle muttered, plaintively, “What’s going on?”

“Cholayna,” Camilla ordered, “get into your pack, try to get one of those pills of yours down Jaelle and Vanessa! That was just the first onslaught, they’ll be back.”

Jaelle blinked and Magda saw her eyes come into focus.

“We were poisoned? Drugged?”

Cholayna nodded, imperatively gesturing for Jaelle to swallow the stimulant capsule. Forcing it down, Jaelle exploded, “Damn them! They had the nerve to
haggle
with us over the price of the food and wine, too!” She got out of her sleeping bag, tried to haul Vanessa to her feet; then gave it up, and grabbing up her knife, Jaelle came to join Camilla. She still looked groggy, but the stimulant was taking effect.