Shard Knight (Echoes Across Time Book 1) (5 page)

Ronan’s stomach churned at the mention of his mother. He spoke as if she still lived. If he slept he could make the pain fade. “I’ll try Master Tyrell.”

Tyrell stood and fished in his pocket before handing Ronan a key. “Take this. It unlocks the house next door.”

He meant the dark house. Ronan didn’t need further clarification.

“If anyone comes to the front door, don’t answer. Go to the cellar. There’s a doorway down there that connects this house to the one next door. And if all else goes wrong, meet me at the entrance to Old Town at first light. Do you know your way?”

“I can find it. Yes.” Ronan took the key. “How long will you be gone?”

“A few hours.” Tyrell squeezed Ronan’s shoulder. “I’m sorry Ronan. I never meant for this to happen.”

Ronan said nothing as Tyrell left the house and locked the door behind him.

***

Downstairs, the front door creaked on its hinges.

Ronan pushed himself up and rubbed sleep from his bloodshot eyes. Rest had come in fifteen minute bursts during the short rain-soaked night, but, mercifully, it came free of nightmares. With a yawn, he pulled on his boots and slipped on the ridiculous blue uniform jacket.

Murmured conversation filtered through the bedroom’s closed door.

Sir Alcott had arrived with Tyrell. Ronan thanked Elan something had gone right this evening. He pulled open the bedroom door and froze.

“The old man saw him come in this house,” someone said.

“That old man is a drunken bum. For a copper penny, he’d of seen the ghost of your dead grandmother,” a second voice said.

A chill ran along Ronan’s spine. He didn’t know these voices.

“Listen up Prince Ronan. We know you’re in here. Come on out. We’ve captured that traitor Tyrell, so he can’t hurt you anymore.” The voice yelled through the dark townhouse.

Ronan slipped backwards into the bedroom’s shadows leaving the door cracked. He didn’t believe the city guard had captured Master Tyrell.

Heavy footsteps thumped off wooden floorboards below.

Ronan’s stomach sank. With at least two men downstairs, he couldn’t reach the cellar escape route.

“We’re on your side. Save us all a lot of trouble, and we don’t have to hurt you,” the second guard said.

“You idiot, why’d you’d tell him that?” The first guard said.

“Listen Rory, I don’t have to take that from you, and I told him we wasn’t gonna hurt him,” the second guard said.

Ronan crossed the room to the one escape route the small room offered.

A cracked window opened to a sheer fifteen foot drop. Lurking in the shadow strewn street below, city guards hovered near the front door, and two others crept toward the townhouse’s rear door.

Sweat formed on Ronan’s brow and beaded on his upper lip. He might break his leg jumping out the window, and they’d catch him besides.

The bottom stair creaked followed by the ringing sound of cold steel sliding from its scabbard.

Ronan moved to the door and poked his head into the darkened hallway.

Where the narrow hallway ended, a rickety wooden ladder led up to a sealed attic door. The splintered ladder had several missing or cracked rungs.

Moving up the staircase, heavy footfalls grew louder.

“Lord Randal said he didn’t care if he lived or died. Let’s just kill him and go,” the second guard said.

“He’s a kid you heartless bastard. What’s wrong with you?” Rory said.

With his pulse racing, Ronan threw open the bedroom door, raced along the hallway, and pulled himself up the ladder.

“You check to the left. I’ll go right,” Rory said.

Ronan stifled a scream as he pushed on the attic door. It didn’t move an inch. Multiple layers of paint combined with years of disuse had sealed it shut.

“There he is!” The heavy guard dashed toward Ronan. “Get down from there you little bastard.”

Ronan slammed his shoulder into the door, but it remained stuck. A surge of hot panic rushed through his body as he felt a hand wrap around his ankle.

The second guard stood at the ladder’s base with his hand locked around Ronan’s ankle. “I got him Rory. Help me pull him down.”

“Get off me you fat bastard.” Ronan slammed his boot’s heel into the guard’s face.

With an audible pop, the guard’s head snapped backward. Blood poured from his nose as he sank to one knee cupping his face with his hands. “My nose! Elan damn him, he broke by nose!”

With another surge, Ronan heaved his shoulder into the attic door. This time it moved an inch as sharp pain flared in his shoulder.

Rory sprinted along the hall and stopped next to his friend.

“Pull him off that ladder Rory. Use your sword if you have to.” His words sounded nasally as if he had cotton balls shoved up his nostrils.

In a desperate surge, Ronan sent his shoulder flying into the door again. Pain ripped through his shoulder as the door gave way sailing upward into the dark space of the attic.

“It’s over boy. Come down. You can’t escape from there. You aren’t a bird,” Rory said.

Ronan ignored the guard, grabbed the dark hole’s rough edges, and pulled himself inside the attic.

Rory, a large man by any measure, slid his blade into its scabbard, clenched his jaw and started up the ladder. “We’re to do this the hard then.”

With his heart hammering, Ronan scoured the pitch-black attic for some weapon he could use. But, his eyes couldn’t break through the blanket of darkness shrouding the space around him. He settled on the dislodged attic door lying a few feet away.

“Boy, if you make me chase you into this attic, I’m gonna throw you in chains. Get down here. Now!” Rory reached the attic’s entrance and struggled to pull his enormous belly through the small hole.

Ronan lifted the door overhead and slammed it on top of Rory’s fleshy bald scalp.

Rory screamed, and his weight shifted downward as the ladder rung supporting him gave way under his bulk. Eyes bulging, Rory hurtled backward landing in a twisted heap atop the still reeling guard at the bottom of the ladder.

With a heavy thud, Ronan dropped the attic door into place, and stomped it closed. He’d bought himself a few minutes of precious time and used it to allow his eyes time to adjust.

Through the attic door, different voices shouted instructions, and the footfalls of more guards pounded the main stairway.

Rotted crates, a dust covered rug, a cracked mirror, and an empty splintered bookcase comprised the attic’s inventory. A narrow board ran across the attic floor’s beams ending in a small circular window that had several rotten boards nailed over the opening.

Ronan tiptoed across the thin board arriving at the boarded window. With a sharp tug, he pulled at the rotten boards. The house’s decayed condition worked in his favor as the brittle wood pulled away with little effort. After freeing the second board, the sweet summer air offered cool relief from the attic’s stale confines.

Outside the open window, the rooftop’s steep angle ended ten feet away in a sheer drop-off.

Ronan jumped as a loud banging noise came from the attic door behind him.

A moment later, the door burst apart, and Rory’s head popped through the hole. “I’m gonna kill you now, you little cretin.”

Ronan’s head spun as he scoured the room in a desperate panic. The rooftop offered his only hope. He squeezed and shimmied his way through the small attic window. Cracked wooden shingles scraped and splintered his hands as he steadied himself against the roof’s sharp angle of descent. As he pulled his legs through, he kicked out and whirled his legs around wide to cut off any downward momentum.

“There he is!” A city guard pointed at Ronan. Next to him, an archer pulled an arrow from his quiver and loaded his bowstring.

The steep rooftop provided no escape in any direction, but across a six-foot stretch of open-air, the neighboring townhouse offered hope of refuge.

A sharp hissing noise sliced the air near Ronan, and a second later, an arrow sprouted from the wooden shingles an inch from his feet.

Rory stuck his head through the attic window. “You’re done Latimer.”

The fat guard grabbed Ronan’s jacket, but he twisted free, sprinted toward the roof’s edge and jumped. As he leaped, the sharp whistle of another arrow cut the night air. He sailed forward and slammed into the rooftop breaking his fall with his sore shoulder. Pain exploded in his shoulder as he rolled to a stop.

“Damn slippery bastard!” Rory said across the open divide. The fat guard strained trying to pull his lumbering girth through the tiny attic window.

Relentless pain pulsed through Ronan’s shoulder as he flailed from side to side willing away the agony.

The attic window creaked under Rory’s excessive weight, and with a final push, he popped through the window like a cork from a champagne bottle.

“He’s in the second house. Go!” A voice from street level said.

Rory wheezed as he lifted his bulk from the sharp-angled roof and lined up for the identical jump. With a grunt, he leaped across the six-foot gap, but began his descent far short of the neighboring rooftop. He latched onto the roof’s edge as his body slammed into the house’s wooden side.

Ronan used his shoulder to push himself to his knees, and a shot of pain lurched through his arm.

Rory’s face flushed scarlet as he labored to pull his heavy body onto the rooftop. Inch by inch he pulled himself upward until both arms hooked over the roof’s edge.

Ronan’s breath came in ragged pulls. He staggered onto his feet and eyed the struggling guard.

With arms trembling, Rory pulled himself halfway onto the rooftop. In mere moments he’d have his body over the roof line.

Ronan supported his injured arm and staggered toward the struggling guard.

Rory’s eyes opened wide with fear. “Have mercy. Please.”

They’d showed his mother no mercy, and he felt none for this man. With determination fueled by naked revenge, he poured his anger into a brutal kick that connected with the guard’s open mouth.

With a sickening crunch, Rory’s head jerked back, and his face erupted in a bright flash of crimson. As his eyes rolled back into his head, consciousness faded from the guard’s expression. His arms slackened, and he fell disappearing beneath the edge of the roof.

As Ronan appeared near the building’s edge, the archer raised his bow and drew a bead.

Ronan’s stomach sank as he watched the arrow leave the archer’s bow. He flung his body backward as the arrow’s fletching brushed his rib cage. With a thud, he landed on his backside and inspected his chest and stomach for damage.

“Stenson and Gilpin, get inside that house now!” A stern voice rang out.

Ronan sat on his knees and pulled in agonizing breaths as he tried to calm the pounding in his chest.

Guards scrambled onto the front porch and pounded the locked door.

Ronan jumped to his feet and ran toward the rooftop door. He yanked the handle, and the door didn’t move.

His stomach hardened into a sickening knot. He pulled again. Nothing.

“The bloody door is made of steel,” a voice said from the front porch.

A thought struck Ronan. Tyrell must’ve reinforced the front door frame. The bloody door frame.

He pushed the door, and it opened inward.

Relief poured through his aching muscles.

A small dingy bedroom stood empty of any furnishings. On room’s far side a set of stairs descended deeper into the home’s interior.

Ronan took two stairs at a time before stumbling into a short hallway.

At the dark hallway’s end, a stairway descended.

He dashed ahead and stopped at the landing.

The front door shook in its steel frame as guards continued pounding without mercy. Figures blurred past the hallway window heading toward the rear of the house.

With his heart hammering, Ronan flew downstairs, past the front door running at breakneck speed toward the rear door. He blurred past a small sitting room that opened into a dingy kitchen.

On the kitchen’s far wall, a thin wooden door led outside.

As Ronan moved for the kitchen door, he jumped backward as the door crashed inward flying off its hinges.

His chest heaved, and he whirled looking for somewhere to hide.

A pantry door stood ajar a few feet away.

He grabbed the door handle, threw it open, and slammed it shut behind him.

The front door gave way banging open, and multiple sets of heavy boots came pounding through the small house.

“We tried doing this the nice way. No taking you alive now boy. It ends here,” a guard said as he stormed through the house.

Ronan’s chest tightened as he slumped against the pantry wall.

Footsteps entered the kitchen.

Within seconds they’d have him. Ronan dropped his head between his knees, closed his eyes and prayed to Elan. When he opened his eyes, he held in a shout of triumph.

Buried in the floorboard, a door handle appeared between Ronan’s legs.