Thawed Fortunes (29 page)

Si'mon shook his head slightly. "If anything
she's minimizing what the sisters have all been through in the last
little while. More than one of them has pushed herself right up to
the edge of burning out her own powers and had to be physically
restrained by her husband from doing more."

On'li snorted. "How could we do any less
knowing what was coming? Especially after this hard-headed young
man all but killed himself getting the Daughters here to help Vi'en
buffer us out of our addictions."

Va'del felt himself blushing at the obvious
pride in everyone's eyes. "None of it would have been possible
without the help of the Guard, Vi'en and Master Mark."

Si'mon shrugged. "There isn't a one of you
that isn't deserving of a commendation."

"Even Vi'en, who is rapidly burning up what
goodwill she's garnered by complaining about everything from our
current conditions to how badly you nearly botched the rescue
attempt. Honestly, I don't know how you managed to let her inside
your mind."

The memory of Vi'en oozing through his mind
made Va'del's skin crawl, but he tried to feign indifference in
response to On'li's words. "It had to be done. I thought maybe it
would get easier after the first time, but if anything it was
worse."

His words left an awkward silence for several
moments. Reaching for something to distract Jain, who was looking
more and more angry by the second, Va'del opened his mouth again.
"What about Vladir? We did everything we could to slow him down,
but he'll be here soon."

Si'mon shook his head. "You all did wonders,
but Vladir showed up with a small force this morning. Most of his
knights don't have mounts, and his troops all look nearly as bad as
our sisters do right now, but they are here."

Va'del felt hope start to abandon him. "We
don't have enough people to hold the castle against him."

"No, we don't. If we hadn't been in such poor
shape we could have sallied forth and killed everyone he'd brought
with him in the advance party, but it just wasn't feasible at the
time."

Jain's anger had evaporated to be replaced by
fear. "What will we do?"

Javin spoke for the first time. "We'll let
them inside and then show them that they bit off more than they
expected."

##

Javin waited quietly in the closet, listening
to the mostly-calm breathing of Jameson and Sims, the pair of
guardsmen who'd been assigned to accompany him. All around the
castle the Guadel had been stationed in cleverly concealed ambushes
that they hoped would allow them to carry the day.

Even now, having seen that both On'li and
Mar'li were well on their way to recovering from being drugged by
Vladir, Javin still found it a little hard to focus on events
around him.

His handling of the situation still bothered
Javin. The fact that nearly everyone else had done just as poorly
didn't excuse his failings. If Si'mon hadn't pulled himself
together enough to get the rescue party sent off and if Va'del
hadn't managed to come through in such a spectacular manner, the
very worst would have come to pass. All while Javin had done
nothing.

The massive Guadel shifted slightly, trying
to ease the strain in his legs at the same time that he looked for
a distraction from just how useless he'd been at a time when his
wives had needed him the most.

At least everyone was up and more or less
back to normal now. The plan Javin, Si'mon and Va'ma had put
together still might not be sufficient to get the caravan back up
to the Capital alive, but it provided at least a chance. Better
yet, it did provide the best chance of leaving Vladir with nothing
but tatters to command once all was said and done.

The hope was that the lack of anyone manning
the battlements would lure several squads into the castle to make
sure that the Guadel had really left--presumably through one of the
secret escape passages that all self-respecting castle builders
tended to incorporate into their designs. Once a significant
portion of the army was inside, dispersed and out of contact with
each other, the various Guadel would fall on them, cutting down
individual squads before they could join up into a more effective
force.

On'li's presence was humming in the back of
Javin's mind, monitoring his thoughts for the sudden spike of
emotion that would be her signal to begin the augmentation process.
Just as important right now, the nascent link also reassured him
that she was still okay.

That was the overriding weakness to the whole
plan. If Kra'ven was able to pinpoint where the women were, or even
if a large enough group of soldiers were to stumble onto their
hiding place, then the Guadel would instantly become the prey
instead of the hunters.

For the first time in cycles, Javin heard
footsteps in the hall, and he felt eagerness flow through him as
Mar'li joined On'li in his mind, and the pair began weaving their
augmentation around him.

Time steadily slowed as strength and energy
filled his muscles. Javin waited until he reached a five count
between each of his heartbeats, and then sensing a tension from his
companions that told him they were ready to attack, burst from
concealment.

The squad of eight men had just passed the
closet when Javin appeared behind them with a crash. The first
three men didn't even have time to turn around before he cut them
down, driving through the center of the formation. The next two had
just started to rotate as his paired blades found their hearts.

Javin passed by the next man, and then
dispatched the seventh and eighth before they'd managed to bring
their weapons completely out of their scabbards.

The two guardsmen had cut down the bypassed
man with a cold efficiency that reminded the Guadel that between
the bag'lig attack, the jailbreak, and the rescue mission they'd
completed just two days before, they'd now seen more fighting than
most of their fellows back at the Capital would see during the
course of their entire lives.

Moving out away from the gory mess they'd
left behind, each of the trio stripped off the bloody outer layer
of socks they'd raided from the castle stores, and then moved off
to their next ambush point.

##

Va'ma and the pair of men accompanying him
left the site of their second ambush and slipped into a bedroom
which was located a little closer to the main entrance to the keep.
So far things were proceeding well. He'd cut through the dispersed
squads they'd encountered so fast that neither of his companions
had even bloodied their weapons yet.

The blood roaring through the grizzled Guadel
made him want to charge out into the courtyard, but he was still
rational enough to know that even his three wives couldn't augment
him enough to take on that many men, so instead he searched for the
calm that was the prearranged signal for all three women to cut
down his level of augmentation to the barest trickle of power.

Vitality seemed to leech from his body, but
Va'ma fought to remain calm, and the absence of panic in his
thoughts was enough of a confirmation that they finished powering
down all of his augmentations other than a slightly altered time
sense. There was nothing more to do until the next group blundered
past.

##

Si'mon stalked down the hall, a pair of
guardsmen with crossbows flanking him. They were only a short
distance away from the main door. If he could reach that, he could
bar it and leave what was left of the army stranded outside where
they'd be unable to help save their fellows inside from being cut
to pieces.

If everything was going according to plan,
most of the Guadel should be on their second ambush, and all told
the smaller force should have cut down four or five times their
number. Javin and Va'ma had argued strongly for leaving the door
open for another quarter cycle before converging on it from
multiple directions with groups of three or four Guadel. Si'mon had
tried to convince them otherwise, but had finally decided he'd just
disregard orders and make sure it was closed sooner than the plan
called for.

It would likely result in
the Guadel not being able to kill as many inside the keep before
being forced to go to a more classic siege, but it was a more
acceptable risk in Si'mon's mind.
Better
to bite off too little than too much.
Va'ma and Javin were welcome to take Si'mon's disobedience up
with the Council if it meant that they all survived.

The muted, deep quality to the breathing
behind him told the caravan master as much as anything else that he
was linked, that Sophie was boosting his time sense. The poor thing
was probably approaching exhaustion, but just a short time more and
he could fall back and worry about just dealing with however many
soldiers were left inside.

Only the fact that everything seemed to be
moving in slow motion as Si'mon turned the corner allowed him to
recognize the fact that a crossbow quarrel was headed towards his
heart. His sword was much too heavy to possibly move into position
in time, so instead the Guadel brought his dagger up in slow
motion, muscles straining to overcome inertia and air resistance as
the foot-long blade came around in an arc that intercepted the
stubby missile and sent it wide.

Rather than the door being unguarded like
they'd hoped, a mixed squad had been stationed before it. Si'mon
had no illusions about his odds of surviving a charge against so
many prepared foes, but their whole plan hinged on getting that
door closed, so he charged forward into a storm of projectiles as
his companions let fly at a pair of swordsmen on the outer edges of
the group.

##

It was long past the time when they'd figured
they'd be able to wait around and ambush individual squads, so
Javin was now heading towards a rendezvous point with his two
companions in the hopes that by pairing up with another Guadel or
two, the larger group would be able to defeat enemy squads even
without the element of surprise.

The absolute silence of earlier ambushes had
given way to a muted clash of arms throughout the keep, and Javin
started to worry that Si'mon had been right to argue for closing
the main door sooner rather than later. It was too late now to do
anything but head to the meeting point and then try and fight
through to the door.

Javin came around the corner and felt a
shudder run through him as he recognized the body before him.
Stap'en was one of Va'ma's people. The boy had been a Guadel for
less than a year, but Va'ma had indicated that the youngster was
good. Based on where the body had fallen, the corridor should have
prevented more than one person at a time coming at him.

Javin took another couple of steps as he
tried to reason how Stap'en could have been overcome. It was still
early in the fight for Stap'en's wife to have tired and dropped out
of augmentation, but short of that, it was almost impossible for a
single, unaugmented man to take on a full Guadel.

Something about the
corridor that the other Guadel had been killed in was tickling the
back of Javin's mind in a way he'd long ago learned to pay
attention to.
What could possibly be so
important about...It leads to the upper levels.

Suddenly sure who'd cut down young Stap'en,
Javin took off at a sprint after the bloody footprints. His
companions would have to just follow him as they could. Hopefully
someone else would be able to get to the door. Javin had a madman
to stop; hopefully before Jeeves and Va'del were cut down rather
than after--otherwise they were all dead.

##

Peters carefully looked out at the courtyard
from his position of concealment. Entirely too much time had
passed, and his men weren't the only ones worried by the fact that
the main door was still open.

Garth really was right when he said that the
Guadel never seemed to try anything halfway. When their plans
worked, like Va'del's rescue mission had, the results were
spectacular. When one of their over-complicated plans came apart
instead, even the fact that they were all the next best thing to
unkillable sometimes wasn't enough to avoid complete disaster.

The first clash of arms reached the soldiers
below, and the Baron started yelling at one of his captains to get
the portcullis up and bring in reinforcements while he led the
remaining men in to clear out the keep.

Peters waved his men closer, and then calmly
aimed his crossbow at the first man running towards the steps to
the gatehouse. The Baron's man took the bolt in the chest and only
made it up two more steps before losing his balance and crashing to
the courtyard below. The oaths and near panic from the rest of the
Baron's men were eminently satisfying.

Lowering the portcullis was a right dandy
idea when the lowlanders thought the People might still come back
and attack, but now they were stuck inside with several dozen
Guadel and the portcullis was making it impossible to bring in more
reinforcements.

"Stagger your shots and stay out of the line
of fire of those archers below. The route up to the gatehouse is
completely exposed from this direction, and if you move around and
keep them guessing at your real numbers, you may be able to bluff
them for a little while."

The four men he'd pointed at nodded, and
Peters waved for the other five to follow him. The plan called for
Peters and his men to stay up on the battlements, but Va'ma and the
rest had never anticipated that Peters would be dealing with so
many archers, or that the doors would remain open until after
Vladir realized his home had turned into a colossal trap. It was
time to get inside and see if they couldn't join up with more of
the Guard before running into a full squad of the other guys.

##

Vladir stalked inside the castle followed by
a group of his best men. "You, set up archers there and there. The
mage says that the witches are doing something. We need to ensure
that the men already inside aren't cut off before they can return
and report on what they find."