The Fly Guild (26 page)

The creature snarled, bringing Quinton’s
attention back to his more pressing problem. He realized that when he switched
sides, he was now upwind again. Snow could smell him, and it sensed he was
close. Filled with the instinct to kill, the creature dropped into a crouch to
launch itself for another attack. Quinton held his sword point up and braced
for the attack. The beast sprang forward with lightning speed.

But the swirling wind must have messed up
its sense of smell. It partially hit the old woman in the shoulder, knocking
her to the side and against one of the broken pieces of railing. She balanced
precariously on the balcony, wearing the same stupid smile. The creature,
knocked off its trajectory, hit the floor and rolled into the wall, stunned.
Quinton rammed his sword into its exposed chest. Snow let out a horrible scream
and began to thrash madly about. Quinton withdrew his sword and moved to the
corner of the balcony, as far away from the monster as possible.

Its screams started to lessen and its
movements calmed as more blood leaked out of the wound. But then it picked up
its head and caught Quinton’s scent one last time. It tried to launch itself
again, but its front legs failed. It slid across the deck, mouth open and
knocked the old woman’s feet out from under her. Both the creature and the
woman disappeared from view.

Quinton looked over the edge. Snow lay
unmoving on the street. The woman was lying on her side, a pool of blood around
her head, a lifeless smile on her face.

Wren screamed. He turned from Fist and
ran to his mother. Fist tried to follow, but one of the soldiers stepped in to
protect his lord’s back. Wren knelt over his mother, gently picking up her
head. She was gone. He looked up at Quinton, then carefully set his mother’s
head back on the cobblestones. Somewhere down the street, a horn sounded.
Reinforcements were coming. 

Wren stood up and flipped down the visor
on his helmet. His faceplate was silver and was made to resemble a man’s face
-- a man who was clearly insane.

Fist finished off the soldier between
them by driving both spikes through the man’s chest, then throwing him to the
ground. He motioned for Wren to come forward. 

Wren let out a scream and held his sword
up behind him as if to strike, but he was still twenty paces away. He swung the
sword forward. As he did so, the blade lengthened as if the momentum of the
swing itself forced it to elongate. The blade swung down, surprising Fist, who
only had enough time to partially raise a spiked hand in defense of the
magically extended sword. The blade glanced off the spike and bit deep into
Fist’s shoulder. Fist winced in agony. As soon as the blade hit him, it quickly
shrank back to its original length. The horn sounded again. 

The remaining guild members were
scattering to save their own skins. They disappeared into doorways and
alleyways and started climbing the walls. A few were caught and cut down, most
got away.

Quinton had his own problems once again.
The door to the bedroom was kicked open behind him, and several armed men came
storming through. There was no place to go but up. He lifted his legs high and
stepped into the sky using his boots. The men rushed out behind him, swinging
their swords, but he was too high. He continued to climb, but as soon as he
cleared the buildings, the wind buffeted him quickly across several buildings.
He was moving so fast, he was not in control. He quickly pointed his feet down
and crash landed on a roof several blocks away. 

The sky grew darker and the rain kicked
up once more. He used rooftops to get close to the wall, then found a spot
where the guard was not paying close attention, made a quick ascent up the
stairs, then climbed down the outside of the wall. He had to get Kate and get
them out of the city. There was no choice now.

As he made his way through the streets,
there were more signs of chaos. Wren’s men had obviously started without him.
Ordinary people, caught on their way to work or the market, had been cut down
in the streets. Shutters that hadn’t been torn off of the lower levels of the
buildings were flapping madly against the windows. Wren’s men were on a
rampage, and it no longer mattered whose side you were on. There was only one
side now, Wren’s.

Quinton was passing down a street when a
blue cape caught his eye. He stopped and looked closer at the unmoving body
that it was wrapped around. Her dark hair was matted to her face in a
combination of rain and blood, and her eyes stared blankly ahead. A spear had
been driven through her torso, and there were several cuts on her arms. There
were several of her followers and a few soldiers around her in death’s embrace,
so she had gone down fighting. Glitter’s revolution was over, which was
probably for the best since it was abundantly clear who was going to win the
war. Quinton gently closed her eyelids with the flat of his hand, touched her
cold head to say goodbye, then ran on down the street.

By the time he made his way past the
roving gangs of thugs and patrols of soldiers to the Pink Lady, the sky was
starting to turn black. The wind was now gusting so hard at times, it made it
difficult to walk, and the rain was blowing sideways, pelting him in the face.
He went through the side door to look for Kate. The girls he passed quickly
looked away.

“Where is she?” he called to one of them,
worried that she had been hauled off by the gangs.

The girl didn’t answer, she just looked
at the floor. 

Enraged, Quinton drew his sword and
marched toward her with the blade pointed at her throat. “I’m already
responsible for one death today, so I’m not really concerned about one more,”
he hissed to her.

“She left,” the girl stammered, eyeing
the tip of the blade that was touching her throat. “She had food and said she
was leaving for good.”

“When?”

“Maybe a half hour ago. She said she was
meeting someone by some market where there was a break in the wall.”

Half an hour? She had a headstart, but at
least she was probably safe. Quinton sheathed his sword, took a quick look out
the doorway then headed out at a trot. He got to the middle of the street and
stopped cold. “How did she know about the break in the wall?” he said to
himself. He had never told her about it. Had someone else told her? How would
she know where to go to meet him? He shook off the questions for now. There
would be time for answers later. If he was going to catch her, he had to run
now.

***

The streets and buildings blurred by. The
break was on the other side of the city from where he was. Street by street he
moved, and the scene was the same, dead bodies, broken lives, looted homes,
stunned people. On occasion, he had to move to the rooftops to bypass soldiers,
but the storm had slowed the pace of destruction.

Then a strange thing happened. The wind
dropped off considerably and the rain slackened. The storm had finally blown
itself out. Quinton doubled his efforts. His legs ached and his heart pounded,
but he willed his body to press on.

He finally reached the Lombard Fish
Market and its massive walls. The door was half open, so he raced through. The
inside was abandoned, and other than some overturned empty crates, it showed
little sign of being disturbed. He started to relax. Even if Kate had made it
over the wall, he would catch up to her on the other side. He spotted the small
door that would lead him to the large open area that was across from the
crumbled wall. Before opening it, he took a moment to catch his breath. Sprinting
across the city had sapped the last of his energy. It was all he could do to
pull the door open.

He gasped at what he saw on the other
side. There were bodies everywhere. Broken weapons, arrows and spears dotted
the ground. Streams of blood mixed in with the pooling rainwater. Apparently a
lot of people knew about the breach and had headed here, only to be caught by
soldiers. Some almost made it; their bodies were three-fourths of the way up
the pile of stones. A few of the people in the courtyard were still alive,
their moans rising above the wind. The refugees had tried to take what few
belongings they had with them. Mixed in with the battle debris were bags of
dried meats, cheeses and bread. A few geese clucked in their wooden cages and a
large rug with decorative ropes tied on to each corner was draped over the
rocks, its owner lying nearby with his head smashed in.

Then he saw her. Making her way up the
side of the pile near the top, she was there. She was alive. But she wasn’t
alone. The figure looked familiar. He recognized the clothes and the way he
moved, even though he was soaked. It was Huck. He took a step toward them and
called out. “Hey!” It would be easier to get through the swamp with three,
anyway.

Kate kept moving up the final steps of the
pile and started to disappear down the other side. Quinton called out again.
Huck stopped at the very top and looked back at Quinton. He gave him a mock
salute, then unfastened a small leather pouch from his belt. He reached back
and threw the bag to the base of the stones, where it landed with the clinking
of coins.

Quinton took one step toward the rocks to
follow them. There was a quick hissing sound, then he dropped to one knee as
his right calf gave out in a sharp pain. His leg burned and he felt an odd
sensation. When he looked at his leg, there was an arrow through his calf. The
bloody tip was sticking out one side, the feathered end sticking out the other.
He looked up to the top of the rock pile, but Huck was gone. He tried to stand,
but his leg gave out. The pain was intense, and the shaft of the arrow was
preventing his leg from working right.

He caught movement out of the corner of
his eye. He had forgotten about the archer. He reached for his sword, but a
voice called out a warning.

“I wouldn’t do that.”  Quinton knew
the voice. It was familiar, but who? He looked up and saw the older boy, the
one who had been a hunter, the one Huck called Big Shot, standing next to the
bag Huck had thrown down. He had another arrow nocked and held the bow with his
left hand and picked up the bag with his right. The bag disappeared into his
shirt and he moved his hand back to the bowstring and cautiously approached
Quinton.

He looked up at the boy standing over
him. His face was blank and he was staring at Quinton’s leg. 

“I need my arrow back.”

“What?” Quinton gasped.

“If you hold still, I’ll take that out. I
can’t save the arrow, but I can save the tip and the feather, which will make
it easier to make a new one.” He looked at Quinton. “But no funny business.”

Quinton nodded. The boy pulled out a
long, slender knife as he sat his bow down. He snapped off the point and then
snapped off the feathered end, leaving only the narrow wood shaft in his leg.
He grasped Quinton’s leg with one hand and the knife and the arrow shaft with
the other. With a quick pull, it was out. Quinton screamed in pain and clasped
his hands over the holes to stem the flow of blood.

“Why did you do it?” he asked the boy.
“Why did you shoot me?”

The boy was carefully examining the point
for any sign of damage. He then shifted his eyes to meet Quinton’s. “Because
they paid me to.”

“They?”

The boy nodded. He stuck the arrow pieces
into his belt, sheathed the knife and picked up his bow. “The soldiers will be
back soon.” His tone throughout was emotionless. He didn’t care about anyone
involved. He was just doing a job. He glanced around, then trotted off,
disappearing through one of the other doors of the courtyard. 

Walking was out of the question. His leg
wouldn’t respond. All his mind was doing was replaying Kate and Huck
disappearing over the wall together as he laid there in the rain. The plan he
had dreamed of for so long, and he was so close to seeing it work. He crawled
over to a pillar and propped himself up against it, next to a man who was
holding in his guts with his hands. Somehow, the man was still alive.

“I told you not to trust anyone,” rasped
the man. 

Quinton looked more closely at the man’s
face. “Master Grubbs?”

The man let out half a smile before
wincing in pain. “Just Grubbs to you now, sir.”

Quinton nodded and returned the
smile. The man who had started with him at the guild after he survived the
crimper would be here with him at the end. It was fitting.

“Reach into my pocket,” he said. Quinton
looked at him for a minute, then followed the man’s eyes to his shirt pocket.
He reached in and pulled out a small glass vial. 

“Pour some of the liquid on your wounds,
then drink the rest.”

Quinton stared at him, not understanding.

“It’s healing magic. It will fix your
leg. You can still escape.”

Quinton shook his head and tried to hand
the bottle back to him. “No, it’s yours. You should take it. Your wounds are
worse.”

“Much worse than you know,” he said as
blood ran out of the corner of his mouth. “It’s powerful magic in that bottle,
but not powerful enough to save me. But you ... ” his voice trailed off and he
started coughing. Quinton could hear the liquid in his lungs as he coughed.

“How do you know it will work?” 

“Trust me,” he said. 

“But you just said ... ”

“I know what I said and it was true. I
spent almost my whole life being afraid of things. I was afraid of Fist. Afraid
of the guild. Afraid of the city. Afraid of the swamps. I stayed in misery
because I was too afraid to leave. I dreamed of freedom, freedom from fear, but
I was too afraid to try.” He coughed again. “Use the vial. Make for the swamp.
Any berries you find that are black are safe to eat. Stay away from the red
ones. There are many bad things out there, but if you make it past the swamp, you
will be free.”

Quinton looked at him. His eyes were
starting to droop. The loss of blood was too much.