Warrior Priest of Dmon-Li: The Morcyth Saga Book Three (34 page)

Before James even realizes it, the battle is
over and the guards lie dead on the floor, their blood beginning to
pool by the door. He and Jiron take the bodies and drag them into
the room with the cells.

The prisoners begin to once again clamor to
be let out. Once the guards are within the room, they again leave
and close the door behind them.

Going back to the stairs, they once more
begin climbing to the next level, making what feels to James as
three complete circles before coming out into a basement of some
sort. It’s a large, dark room with boxes stacked around the
edges.

A door sits in the wall to their right and
across from them, a stairway extends up. James signals for Miko to
watch the stairs as he goes over with Jiron to the door. “Which
way?” he asks him.

“I don’t know,” replies Jiron. “My best
guess would be the stairs, since he wasn’t below. We need to find
someone who can tell us where to find him.”

“I know, we’ll never find him in time
hunting blind,” admits James.

“Can’t you do that bubble thing to find
him?” he asks.

Shaking his head, James replies, “No, I
don’t know him at all so it wouldn’t work. If I had something of
his, maybe, but I don’t.”

Before they head up the stairs, they check
the other door first, just in case while Miko watches the stairs.
Opening the door a couple inches, they discover a darkened corridor
extending away from the room. James looks to Jiron and says, “Not
this way, let’s go up the stairs. He isn’t down here.”

Closing the door, they move back over to
where Miko is keeping an eye on the stairs. “Anything?” James asks
him.

“No,” he replies. “Haven’t heard
anything.”

Jiron takes the lead as they move up the
stairs. It runs fairly straight up and after fourteen steps comes
out on a wide hallway running to the right and left.

Candles spaced every twenty feet or so give
off a soft light. To the right, the hallway extends for a hundred
feet before turning to the left. The other way, it extends further
until finally disappearing into the distance.

Jiron glances to James who just shrugs.
Stepping into the hallway, Jiron begins moving to the right, the
others following close behind.

They pass three doors before the hallway
turns to the left. Glancing around the corner, he sees it extending
further into the distance. “It’s clear,” he says as he goes around
the corner and continues following the hallway.

All the doors they pass are closed and a
quick check fails to hear anything within. Suddenly, further down
the corridor, a door opens and a woman walks out into the hallway.
A servant by her dress, she glances their way and her eyes open
wide.

Jiron sprints toward her as a scream escapes
her lips. A second later, Jiron grabs her and clamps his hand over
her mouth, silencing her. She struggles to free herself but is no
match for him.

Placing a knife against her throat causes
her to cease her struggling and to become quiet. He walks her back
to where James and Miko stand, all the while expecting other doors
to open in response to her scream. But either there’s no one else
down here or a woman screaming in this area is common, for no other
door opens.

“Do you understand me?” James asks her when
Jiron has brought her close.

She nods her head and they all breathe a
sigh of relief.

“What’s your name?” he asks.

“Elspa,” she replies.

“Elspa, do you know where they’re keeping
the captured general?” he asks.

“I think in the north tower,” she says, a
fearful quaver in her voice.

“Where’s that?” Miko asks.

Elspa looks to him and says, “It’s on the
other side of the Keep.”

“Of course,” mumbles James.
Couldn’t be
just above us, oh no, it has to be all the way on the other
side!

“You’re going to take us there,” James tells
her. “And if you give us away, or trick us, my friend here will
make sure you’re the first to die.”

He sees her eyes open wide as they flick
momentarily to Jiron. “Do you understand?” he asks her.

Nodding her head, she quietly says, “Yes, I
do.”

“Now, what’s the best way to get there?” he
asks. Then he adds, “Without being discovered.”

“There’s no direct way to get there,” she
tells him. “And the whole tower is full of guards, you’ll never
make it to where they’re keeping him.”

“You let us worry about that,” he says.
“Now, I understand that servants often have a way of moving about
to avoid being underfoot. I want you to take us along those ways as
best you can.”

She nods her head. “It’s this way,” she
tells him, pointing down to where she had just entered the
corridor.

James nods to Jiron who takes her by the arm
and holds her close as she begins to lead them down the hallway. As
they reach the door that she’d exited from, she pauses a moment
before opening the door.

They move through into a narrow hallway.
“This leads to the lower kitchens,” she says as she continues
along. “Another of these passages leads from the kitchens to the
main banquet room which should be relatively empty at this time of
night.”

“What about the kitchens,” Jiron says. “Will
there be anyone there?”

Sighing, she replies, “There’s always
someone there but any other way and you risk being spotted even
more.”

“Alright,” James says.

They continue down the hallway until they
begin to smell the yeast of many loaves of bread rising as they’re
being prepared for the morning meal. Slowing down, Jiron hands the
girl to James as he moves forward to check the kitchen.

The kitchen is a large room with many tables
and ovens. Ten tables are lined with loaves of bread dough, and
beneath one of them is a boy sleeping. The boy appears to be the
only one currently in the room.

He goes back to the others and tells them
what he’d seen. “That’s Kibby”, she tells them. “He’s the baker’s
apprentice and is there to make sure the bread is ready for baking
in the morning.” She looks to them and asks, “You’re not going to
hurt him are you?”

“If we can get through without waking him,”
James assures her, “then I see no reason to harm him.”

She nods her head and they move closer to
where the hallway opens up into the kitchen. She points off to the
right where another small hallway leads away from the kitchen,
“That’s the one you want.”

James indicates with a nod of his head for
her to precede them. She moves out, stepping cautiously, trying to
remain as quietly as she can as she moves around the table where
Kibby is sleeping.

As they move through the kitchen, Miko snags
some bread sitting on a counter that was left over from the night
before and begins munching on it. When James looks at him, he just
gives him a smile as he continues chewing. James grabs one as
well.

They reach the hallway and James glances
back at the still sleeping Kibby beneath the table. Then he turns
back and follows Elspa as she continues to lead them through the
Keep.

From up ahead, they hear someone coming
toward them. They duck down another side passage and hold still and
quiet as the person approaches.

Jiron holds a knife to Elspa’s throat to
prevent her from crying out. Then a man walks by their hiding spot
and continues down the passage. Once the man’s footsteps can no
longer be heard, they return to the passage.

“That was Olyth, the baker,” she tells them
once Jiron has removed his knife from her throat.

“Let’s go, we’re running out of time,” urges
James.

She begins leading them again down the
passage. They go for several hundred feet when she again comes to a
stop. Indicating further down the passage ahead of them, she says,
“Up ahead, it opens into the banquet room.”

Jiron moves forward and then pauses at the
end of the passage. He returns quickly and says, “She’s correct,
it’s the main hall alright. It looks empty.”

They move to the end of the passage and
James asks, “Where now?”

She points over to another, wider passage
across the hall and says, “We’ll have to take that one, there’s no
servant’s way on that side of the keep.”

“Where does it lead?” James asks her.

“To the north tower,” she tells him.
“There’ll be guards, you’ll have no chance to sneak in there.”

“We’ll see,” he says. Moving to the edge, he
glances around the room and then they move quickly across to the
other hallway.

It’s much wider than the one they’d been in
and has more candles keeping it well lit. Moving down the passage,
they pass many doors made of finer quality than the ones they’d
seen earlier.

Suddenly from up ahead, three guards
suddenly move into the passage heading in their direction. James
opens the door they’re closest to and they all rush into the room
before the guards spot them.

Once the door is closed, Jiron keeps his ear
to the door as James looks around the room. It looks to be a
sitting room, where ladies could visit and entertain guests. A
doorway leads to another room and James moves toward it to see if
there’s anyone there.

As he gets closer, he begins to hear the
unmistakable sounds of someone snoring. He looks through the
doorway and sees a large bed with two bodies sleeping under covers.
Backtracking quickly and quietly he goes back to where the others
are waiting by the door.

Jiron opens the door and peers out to see if
the guards are still there. Bringing his head back in, he says,
“They’re gone.”

“Good, there’s someone sleeping in the other
room,” James tells him as he points through the doorway.

“Then let’s go,” he says as he takes Elspa
and returns to the hallway. The others follow and Miko closes the
door quietly behind them.

“How far to the tower?” James asks her.

“Not very,” she replies. She points to a set
of double doors further down where the hallway turns to the left
and says, “That’s the entrance. It’s the only way I know to get
there.”

As they continue to approach, he says, “How
many guards are there?”

“I don’t know,” she replies, “I’ve never
been there, my duties were always elsewhere.”

“Then I’m afraid this is where we must part
ways,” he says to her.

Her eyes open wide, expecting to be killed
on the spot. He moves to a door and listens for a moment. When he
doesn’t hear anything, he opens it up and finds another sitting
room. This whole area must be guest rooms for visiting nobles.
Moving quickly, he looks through to the bedroom and with relief,
finds it empty.

Returning to the sitting room, he grabs
Elspa and drags her to the bedroom where he gags her mouth and ties
her up securely. “I’m not going to kill you,” he tells her. She
calms down somewhat when she sees a gold piece appear in his hand.
“I appreciate your helping us,” he says as he places the gold piece
within a pocket of her outfit.

He gives her a wink and then returns to the
front room where the others are waiting for him. Jiron is by the
door and when he sees the nod from James, opens it up and checks to
make sure the hallway is empty before they step out.

Moving down toward the double doors that
Elspa had told them led to the north tower where Pytherian is being
held, they quickly cross the distance and stand before them.

Miko keeps watch down both hallways while
Jiron listens at the doors. After a minute, he lifts his head away
and says, “I think there’re two guards on the other side, can’t be
sure. I do hear something though.”

“What do you propose?” James asks him.

“If there are just the two, we might be able
to silence them quickly before they alert the whole keep,” he
whispers to him. “But if there are more than two, then we’ve got
problems.”

“No way to know for sure is there?” James
asks him.

He shakes his head, “No, there isn’t.”

“Then let’s move quick and decisively,” he
says. Jiron nods in agreement.

Drawing his knives, he makes ready to pass
through the doors. James takes three stones out of his pocket, the
last ammo he has, and prepares.

Miko takes the handles of the doors as he
prepares to swing them open to allow Jiron and James to fight those
within.

When both James and Jiron signal Miko that
they’re ready, he swings open the doors.

When the doors swing open, Jiron rushes in
and trips over two bodies entwined on the floor before the door.
James looks incredulously at the guard with his pants down around
his ankles lying atop the half naked girl. He stands there in shock
as they look at him and the girl opens her mouth to scream.

Miko gets over his shock and draws his knife
as he dives toward her. Her scream begins to escape her lips just
as his hand comes and covers her mouth, silencing her.

The guard reaches for his sword that’s lying
next to him, but Jiron has already recovered from his fall and
kicks it out of reach.

“Get up!” James orders the guard as he
closes the double doors.

The guard keeps his eyes on them as he gets
up off the girl and pulls his pants up. The girl tries to cover
herself as well, her muffled scream subsiding as she realizes
they’ll not be killed immediately.

James gestures for Miko to remove his hand
from her mouth and then for the girl to get up. She pulls her
clothes around her as she gets to her feet, obviously
terrified.

The hallway extends from the double doors
twenty feet before ending at a stairway which winds its way up to
the tower above. Two doors, one on either side of the hallway, lie
between the double doors and the stairs. James nods his head to the
one on the left side and Jiron moves over to the door and listens.
He looks back to James and shakes his head, indicating he doesn’t
hear anything.