The Gate of Gods (Fall of the Ile-Rien) (14 page)

The heavy silence was making her ears hurt. She could hear the distant sirens of the Capidaran militia but no hint of movement or voices from the houses on either side of her. The inhabitants must have fled, but it was unnerving.

Florian reached a heap of rubble that had been someone’s garden wall and edged around it, getting a view of the alley behind the old manor house’s back court. The wooden gate was closed. She bit her lip, seeing that the conservatory windows on the second floor were broken out and the bricks around them singed.
Gerard must have been there, he could have warded the house against fire. They must be all right.
She needed to make sure no one was in the garden before she went through the gate. Glancing around, she stepped back to the rubble, putting one foot carefully on a broken pile of bricks and reaching to grab the part of the wall still standing. The rubble moved under her foot, making a loud chink of brick against brick; she froze.
Nobody could have heard that,
she told herself sternly, and started to boost herself up.

Someone clapped a hand over her mouth from behind and yanked her off the rubble, pinning her arms to her sides. Terror giving her extra strength, Florian didn’t bother to try to scream, just bit down into the gloved hand with all her might, mentally fumbling for a defensive spell.

He dragged her back against the wall and an almost voiceless whisper in her ear said, “Florian, it’s Valiarde.”

Oh.
Feeling like a fool, Florian released his hand. It was Nicholas, Tremaine’s father, dressed in the dark overcoat and suit he had been wearing last night. She noticed irrelevantly that he had cut himself shaving that morning. He was also giving her a mildly annoyed look. She saw the teeth imprints in his glove and winced, whispering, “Sorry.”

He held a finger to his lips, telling her to be quiet. Just then Florian heard movement on the other side of the wall and a low mutter of voices. Voices speaking Aelin, the Gardier language. She threw a frightened look up at Nicholas. They were standing close together, so the concealment charm probably covered both of them, but the men behind the wall must have a crystal and she was fairly sure they weren’t deaf. She heard footsteps start along the wall, heading toward the gate at the far end.

Nicholas grimaced, releasing her arm and stepping away from her. He motioned for her to stay where she was and she nodded rapidly. She knew very little about Tremaine’s father except what Tremaine had told her: that he was crazy and that it ran in the family. Knowing Tremaine, she found that oddly comforting at the moment.

Just as the man on the other side of the wall reached the gate, Nicholas called something out in Aelin. The steps hesitated, then the man asked a question in the same language.

Nicholas stepped to the gate, his boots soundless on the wet grass, standing just beside it. The gate jerked open and a man in Gardier brown stood there, suspicion etched on his features. His expression didn’t change as his eyes passed over Florian and she knew her charm was working for the moment. Since the fallen brick had been enough to betray her to Nicholas, and she still hadn’t a clue what shadow he had sprung out of, she held her breath and kept absolutely still.

It had been a while since she had seen a Gardier in person. This man had the cropped dark hair but his skin wasn’t the unhealthy pale of the Gardier she had seen on the Isle of Storms; he was even a little sunburned. He wore the same roughly tailored brown uniform they all did, with some of the smaller spell devices attached to his belt, made from chips off the larger sorcerer crystals. He also had a pair of the Gardier version of aether-glasses around his neck. But he didn’t step out of the gate into Nicholas’s reach.

Nicholas waited just out of the man’s view, his eyes narrowing with impatience. Frowning, the Gardier reached for the aether-glasses around his neck.
He’ll see me anyway. Oh, what the hell.
Before she could change her mind, Florian gestured the charm away.

The Gardier started, staring at her, and took that fatal last step. Nicholas was on him instantly, an arm wrapped around his neck, and the man went down with a strangled gasp. Florian skipped out of the way, seeing blood splatter across the dingy gray stones.
God, I didn’t see the knife either,
she thought, shocked. Nicholas had produced it out of nowhere.

Shouts from the house told her the attack had been witnessed. The Gardier collapsed and Nicholas yanked something off the man’s belt, not one of the crystal devices but a metal tube with a handle. He twisted the handle and flung it over the wall toward the house.

Taking her arm, he hurried her down the alley, saying calmly, “We had better report this to the Capidaran authorities. I don’t suppose you know where there’s a working telephone?”

“Was that a bomb?” Florian asked, not wanting to go through the whole encounter without at least getting a word in edgewise.

Nicholas didn’t need to answer her: As they reached the alley the incendiary exploded.

T
remaine landed with a thump on solid stone. She staggered but managed to stay on her feet. The darkness was absolute and it was cold; someone jostled her shoulder, making her stumble. She kept her revolver planted firmly in Balin’s back and tightened her hold on the woman’s collar until she heard a strangled gasp. She didn’t care; she didn’t intend to be jumped in the dark by a Gardier. She just hoped she wasn’t jumped in the dark by anything else.
Uh…I hope we’re in the right place….

“Stay where you are,” Ilias said sharply, cutting across murmurs of confusion and dismay. “There’s a cliff nearby.” He had spoken Syrnaic and Gerard repeated the command in Rienish, which caused the jostling behind Tremaine to stop abruptly.

A cold breeze brought her the smell of water and a clean mossy scent, and she realized that background rush was a river cascading over rocks, somewhere not so distant. Her eyes were starting to adjust and she could make out the arch of the overhang just as Ilias and Gerard had described it, where the opening to the gorge was outlined with a faint sheen of starlight. Then light blossomed behind her and she glanced around to see a misty ball of white sorcerous illumination forming over Gerard’s head.

The light revealed the large domed cave, the half columns carved into the arching stone walls. Scanning the chamber with a preoccupied expression, Giliead said, “We need shelter for the wounded man.”

“Yes, there are rooms back here that should be less exposed,” Gerard said, his voice echoing oddly as the wispy light drifted toward the back of the overhang. “Everyone keep together,” he added. “We didn’t have a chance to search this place thoroughly.”

Tremaine followed the light, prodding Balin along in front of her, only realizing they had gone down a corridor when she bumped against a cold stone wall. She groped her way through a door into a very dark room. Gerard gestured again and more wisps of light appeared, revealing a big drafty chamber with smooth stone walls marked by bands of geometric carving. There was a circular stone rim in the center about a foot high. Though the room was out of the direct path of the wind, a strong draft came from the doorway and cold seemed to radiate off the stone like one of the
Ravenna
’s refrigerated storage cabins.

Giliead carried the wounded man in, lowering him carefully to the smooth floor. Meretrisa and Vervane hurried after him, pulling their coats off to fashion a makeshift pallet.

“We need firewood,” Gerard muttered, looking around. “And we didn’t see anything combustible up here.”

“There has to be a passage outside.” Giliead stood, looking down at the unconscious Capidaran with a worried frown.

“There doesn’t have to be,” Tremaine had to point out, giving Balin a shove to get her further into the room. They should have brought some of the furniture from the house, since it was destined to end up as firewood anyway. “There could have been stairs leading up from the river that collapsed.”

“Tremaine—” Gerard didn’t sound in the mood for random speculation.

“Should we search the place now?” Ilias was at her elbow suddenly, Cletia behind him. “We know this passage is empty and there’s room to hole up here for the night.”

“No, you’re right, we’ll wait till the morning,” Tremaine told him. It would be ridiculous to wander around here in the pitch-dark when they could fortify this room. Then she hesitated, Ander’s words echoing in the back of her brain. “Is that right?”

Ilias snorted and gave her a light thump on the head, apparently the Syprian gesture that meant “don’t be stupid.” He headed back for the door, calling for Giliead, Cletia following him.

Tremaine looked around, trying to decide what to do with Balin, who was standing in sullen and merciful silence. Cimarus approached then, carrying his and Cletia’s packs, asking, “Should I give them the blankets we brought?”

Tremaine saw that Meretrisa and Vervane were huddled on either side of the wounded man, trying to keep him warm. One of Gerard’s light wisps hovered protectively over them. “Yes. No, wait, I’ll do it, and you watch her.” She nodded to Balin. “She’s a Gardier, and she’s already killed her guard and escaped once, so if she moves, gut her.”

“I will,
daiha—
I mean, Tremaine.” There had been a Syrnaic word in there Tremaine didn’t know, and she eyed him suspiciously as he handed over the packs. He put a hand on his sword hilt, gesturing Balin back into a corner. The Gardier woman obeyed, watching him angrily.

I
lias paused in the corridor to tell Giliead, “We should post a guard at the stairwell.”

Giliead looked up and down the stone passage, brows drawn together in thought. One of the floating balls of curse light had followed them, but Ilias saw it didn’t provide much useful illumination. Shadows clung heavily to the corners and the other doorways were just cold black holes; they needed to find something they could make torches out of. “None of these rooms had other doors?” Giliead asked.

“No, just these out to this passage.” Ilias gestured as they moved along the corridor, Giliead stopping to look into each room, using the curse light to make sure each was still as unoccupied as Gerard and Ilias had found it earlier. Cletia trailed after them. Ilias thought he had been fairly successful at ignoring her so far, and meant to continue.

Giliead found the end of the passage, where narrow stairs curled down a round shaft. Cold air flowed up it, but the draft wasn’t as strong as the one that seemed to be blowing straight in off the snowcapped mountains across the gorge. “Let’s put everyone else in that first room, and if anything comes up these stairs, there should be plenty of time to give warning.”

Ilias nodded absently, looking around for a good spot for the sentries to sit. The corridor was a drafty place to rest in, the air damp and heavy with the scent of the river. “Nothing’s getting up that cliff face. Not unless it can fly.” He hesitated, thinking that over. “Or come through the curse gate,” he added, frowning as he looked back down the passage. He could see Gerard there, studying the circle, another of the wispy balls of curse light floating around him.

Giliead lifted a brow, resigned. “We need a sentry there, too.”

“What can I do?” Cletia demanded. She threw a look at Ilias, her features stark in the faint white light. “I want to help.”

Giliead considered her for a moment. “Watch the stairs.”

Ilias was already heading back up the passage. They needed to fix a blanket over the doorway to the overhang chamber or it would be too cold to sleep. If they had to stay here longer than one night they would have to find a way down to the forest; a good fire and a screen of brush for the doorway would make this place almost cozy.

Carefully avoiding the circle, Ilias went to where Gerard was standing near the ledge, staring up at the sky, paging through a sheaf of papers. He glanced up as Ilias stopped beside him, reflected starlight glinting on the glass over his eyes, and explained, “I’m trying to find out where we are.”

Ilias squinted up at the sky, then lifted his brows in surprise. It was a clear night, the stars picked out like ice crystals against the dark void. “That looks like the Archers.” He pointed to the constellation that formed the outline of two men with drawn bows. “And the Mother, and the War Galley. The sky looks like it did before the
Ravenna
made the world-gate and we docked at Capistown.”

“That answers that question.” With a sigh, Gerard tucked the papers back into a leather folder. “So we know we’re somewhere close to the region in your world that Capidara occupies in ours. Hopefully by tomorrow Niles will send for us and we can bring more navigational instruments. We’re rather badly prepared for an extended stay.”

Ilias shrugged. “We’ve got weapons and blankets. If we can get out to the forest, we’ll have everything else we need.”

Gerard turned and one of the light wisps drifted over to him as he started back toward the circle. His face set in bleak lines under the white light, he said, “Yes. I suspect we’re a good deal better off than our friends at Capistown.”

T
remaine carried their other supplies in from the circle and sorted through them, but there wasn’t much there. Her bag contained her clothes, the blanket Karima had given her and some more ammunition for her pistol. Gerard had only a couple of books, some personal items and an electric torch, which at least would come in handy. The Syprians were the only ones who had been able to grab a large number of practical things.

Cimarus still guarded Balin, Cletia had been sent to watch the stairwell down into the cliff, Gerard was in the outer chamber with the circle and Ilias and Giliead were trying to use Giliead’s blanket to block the draft coming through the doorway. This involved using a couple of latchkeys from Gerard’s pocket as nails driven through chinks in the stone and a rock for a hammer and a lot of mock-arguing about who was making the process more difficult by offering alternate suggestions.