Dragon Venom (Obsidian Chronicles Book 3) (45 page)

would become of him and of Bee. Patch had been mad, and had seemed eager to die, but Smudge had shown no such tendency. Bee was still too young to judge.

Bee was beginning to show human traits, though, exactly as Patch and Smudge had—apparently the admixture of cat's blood had made no great difference.

Arlian sighed. The kittens were, to say the least, not a great success; he certainly hoped Brook's child proved a superior alternative.

He wandered along the balcony and down the stairs, glancing out the windows at the sky. The clouds were thick and dark, so dark that it looked more like twilight than mid-morning, but so far no rain had fallen.

"My lord."

Arlian turned, startled, to see Wolt holding out a folded scrap of paper.

"A messenger just brought this. He says it's urgent."

Arlian accepted the paper and read, "Must see you at once, at the Citadel." It was signed, "Rolinor."

He frowned, puzzled. What business would Rolinor have with him?

But then he remembered the image in the bowl, and who Rolinor now represented. It seemed that the dragons wanted to talk to him, and if he would not speak to them directly then their agent would serve.

For a moment he considered going back upstairs, drawing a little blood, and seeing whether he could conjure up an image—but then he decided that no, he did not particularly want to talk to a dragon.

He did not particularly want to talk to Rolinor, either, but he might learn something if he did. He might find out whether the Dragon Society knew anything about his experiments. He might get a sense of whether or not the dragonhearts were in full accord with their masters about recent events.

And while he was at the Citadel he might speak to Lord Zaner, or even the Duke, about the nature of his experiments. He had not kept them informed of his progress, lest they interfere, but perhaps the time had come to let them in on his little secret. Perhaps they would want to elaborate on the city's defenses still further if they knew something the dragons feared was soon to be born here.

They might well already know something of what had happened, of course; the Duke had his spies, and the kittens had been known to everyone in Obsidian House.

T h e messenger is waiting, my lord," Wolt said.

Arlian looked up.

"He says his instructions are to wait and accompany you to the Citadel."

That did not sound as if Rolinor merely wanted to talk; that sounded as if this was setting up yet another inept assassination attempt.

Well, Arlian had no objection to ridding the world of another would-be assassin. "Fetch my sword, and the steel-lined hat," he said.

Half an hour later the obviously nervous messenger ushered him into a small bare chamber in the Citadel's outer wall, where Lord Rolinor sat waiting. No assassin had struck, a fact that troubled Arlian. Why ask him to accompany the messenger if not to regulate his pace and mark him as the target? If the business was truly urgent, Rolinor could have come to Obsidian House in person. If there was a third party Rolinor wished him to meet, or something Rolinor wished to show him, he saw no sign of it in the empty meeting room.

Rolinor, too, appeared nervous as he gestured for Arlian to sit.

"I prefer to stand, my lord," Arlian said. "Now, what is this urgent business you have with me?"

"First, my lord, let me say how very pleased . . . " Rolinor began.

Arlian, suddenly concerned, interrupted him. "What is this urgent business, my lord? I have business of my own to attend to."

"Ah, of course. It would seem, my dear Lord Obsidian, that you have taken something that does not belong to you."

A thought was growing in the back of Arlian's mind, but he suppressed it long enough to ask, "What are you talking about?"

"I refer to a quantity of dragon venom. I am informed t h a t . . . "

He stopped in mid-sentence because Arlian had turned to go.

This was obviously not urgent. This was not something that required an immediate meeting. This was an excuse to ensure that Arlian was in a particular place at a particular time. He had thought that was to locate him so that assassins could strike, but now he realized there was another possibility.

They wanted him here so he would not be somewhere else.

The timing gave it away; the messenger from Rolinor had arrived mere minutes after Black had departed. He had probably been waiting in the street, watching for that departure.

They wanted both Black and Arlian out of Obsidian House. The

hired guards were still there, but presumably Rolinor's employers knew that and had planned accordingly.

Arlian was not absolutely certain what the target was, but it didn't really matter; he strode out the door before Rolinor could react.

"Stop him!" Rolinor called after him. "Stop that man!"

Arlian broke into a run.

At the Citadel gate he bellowed "Follow me!" and beckoned to the guards as he passed. He did not pause to see if they obeyed, but he could hear one of them asking the other "Was that Lord Obsidian?" as he passed.

They would follow, he was sure, but perhaps not immediately, and perhaps not certain whether they were aiding him or pursuing him. In any case, he did not trouble himself about that, but ran full-tilt down the street. He drew his sword as he rounded the old gatepost, and by the time he reached Obsidian House had his swordbreaker out, as well.

He could see as he approached that he had been right in his concern; the front door stood open, and one of the front windows had been smashed in. The hired guards were nowhere to be seen—and he saw one of the livery jackets discarded, as if tossed aside by someone fleeing.

He ran inside, calling, "Wolt! Venlin! Brook!"

No one answered, but he heard voices and a great clatter ahead. He followed the sound across the great hall, under the balcony, and down the passageway toward the kitchens.

There were men in the Duke's white-and-blue uniforms there, men with drawn swords, and lying motionless on the floor by the wall was a figure in Arlian's own household livery, one of his footmen. He could not see the fallen man's face; the intruders' boots blocked his view.

There was no sign anywhere of his caravan guards, no sign that anyone but the footman had opposed this invasion.

Arlian saw now a flaw in his own defenses—without their employer or his steward to rally them, his hirelings had not dared to defy the Duke's own men. They might have fought well enough against ordinary assassins, but when confronted by the Duke of Manfort's own soldiers, they had apparently fled. No one had told them they might face Manfort's own defenders; the possibility had not occurred to Arlian.

These soldiers had no legitimate business here, though, regardless of their uniforms.

Arlian did not bother to give a warning or challenge; there was no need for questions. These men had invaded his property and struck down a member of his staff, and no matter what livery they wore he had the right to defend what was his. Instead of speaking, Arlian simply ran the nearest through as the guardsman turned to face the new arrival. His sword slid easily into the man's side, behind the breastplate, but as the man twisted and crumpled the armor tugged at the blade, and pulling it free took a few precious heartbeats. By the time Arlian had extracted his weapon and recovered his balance the entire party had had time to realize he was there.

So much, he thought, for the element of surprise. It had removed one foe, but he counted five still standing.

He was not motionless while counting, though; even as he pulled his sword free he was slashing with his swordbreaker, keeping the nearest un-wounded invader off-balance. The man was still just beginning to bring his own blade around, fending off the swordbreaker, when Arlian's sword cut his throat. The intruder fell back, sword flailing, as his other hand clutched at his severed jugular. His slow collapse, combined with the motionless soldier on the floor, served to force the two sides apart momentarily.

The sword breaker had been an effective distraction. Guardsmen were not ordinarily trained in two-bladed dueling tactics; their duties did not generally include fighting noblemen. Arlian knew that, and hoped to exploit it further.

All the same, right now he was standing in a corridor perhaps eight feet wide, facing four angry guardsmen alone, and there was definitely room for two of them to attack at once—perhaps three, if they coordi-nated their assault. The two he had taken down were not actually dead yet, and if the second could stanch the bleeding he might well be able to rejoin the fight. And all six wore breastplates.

Arlian had thought he would be facing assassins in the street, so he was not totally unprepared; he wore a mail shirt beneath his blouse, and his hat was lined with a steel cap. Still, his foes were better armored.

He wondered whether they were bright enough to keep him busy

while one or two went down the corridor, up the back stairs, out to the balcony, and then down again, to surround him. So far they showed no sign of doing so.

"We've got him," one man said, as he faced Arlian. "You get on with it"

And that was the even worse possibility—that two of them would keep him busy while the others finished their assignment. It was possible that they were merely looking for the bottle of venom that stood on the kitchen shelf, but far more likely they were here to kill Brook and her unborn child.

But then why were they all bunched in the passageway? Arlian tried to peer past them, to see if Brook was there, perhaps caught between the soldiers and the kitchen door, but he could see no sign of her.

Then he realized where they were. The soldiers were standing in front of the lift that carried Brook and her wheeled chair from one floor to the other.

Then he had no time to worry about Brook as the two men nearest him attacked, almost simultaneously.

They weren't very good at it, fortunately; he was able to parry one sword with his own, the other with his swordbreaker, as he fell back a step. As they lunged again, not quite in unison, he turned sideways, letting one go past while catching the other's blade on his swordbreaker again. He had no good opening at side or head, and the breastplate protected the chest, but his own counterattack plunged his sword into the meaty part of the soldier's thigh.

"Damn you!" the man grunted, swinging wildly. Arlian, with one blade in the man's leg and the other fending off the other attacker, was unable to completely avoid the strike; the sword's tip slashed at his right arm just above the elbow, shredding the linen sleeve and scraping across the mail beneath. He was forced back a step, his back to the corridor wall.

Then the wounded man went down, his leg no longer able to support his weight. Under other circumstances Arlian would have given him a chance to surrender, or waited to see what happened, but with three more attackers he could not afford mercy. He thrust the point of his sword through the fallen man's eye.

Then he turned to face the other*.

Two of them were coming after him, while the third was doing

something at the door of the lift. He was reaching upward, jabbing his sword through the opening, and Arlian realized that the lift was between levels, its floor perhaps six feet up.

That had been clever of Brook, he thought, taking refuge there—

but then he was too busy defending himself to think about anything but staying alive.

One of his opponents, the one who had been facing him all along, was no great threat, but the other proved to be the best swordsman of the lot. Only Arlian's mail saved him from one particularly smooth lunge at his heart; he was able to turn so that the strike glanced across the rings instead of penetrating, but had the metal not been there the blade would have pierced his left lung.

The presence of the stone wall behind him was both good and bad; it meant he did not need to worry about an enemy behind him, but it limited his own movement, as well. He could only retreat in one direction, toward the great hall. That did give him an escape route if he needed one, though.

He heard movement from that direction, and wondered whether it was some member of his staff coming to help. None of them were trained swordsmen, but perhaps one could go for help.

But who would they go to? These intruders were ostensibly the Duke's men, and Arlian's relationship with His Grace had been sufficiently uneven that the staff could scarcely be sure that the Duke had not sent them.

Arlian was quite sure that the Duke hadn't sent them; no, if they were indeed the Duke's men, they had been bribed by the Dragon Society. The Duke would have no reason to want Brook dead; neither would any of his present advisors. When last Arlian had spoken to the Duke they had parted on good terms, with the Duke hopeful about Arlian's mysterious experiments, and Arlian had heard not the slightest hint that the Duke's attitude had changed.

But Wolt and Stammer and the others wouldn't know that.

Someone might fetch Black, though. That would be just one more trained fighter, but Arlian had already cut the initial six-to-one odds in half, and one more might well be enough to take them all. Black would certainty fight as fiercely for his wife's life as anyone would ever fight for anything.

If the servants were there this might be a good point to break off the fight temporarily, retreat to the great hall and regroup, perhaps hear whether Black was on the way—if Brook was still alive in the lift, as he fervently hoped, she could surely hold out another few seconds. His muscles tensed. He retreated a step, and risked a glance toward the great hall, hoping to see a familiar face there.

His heart sank.

There were three more of the Duke's guards, approaching with

swords drawn.

He was surrounded.

A State of Siege

42

A State of Siege

To one side were three live foes, two facing him and the third busily thrusting a sword into the lift; four men lay on the floor in that direction, either dead, dying, or dazed. To the other side three more enemies were drawing near. No help was in sight.