Stones Unbound (The Magestone Chronicles Book 1) (4 page)

Hoyle watched Celia carefully as the three of them waited on
the side of the Merchant’s Square.  She still gripped her necklace or brooch
under her robes with one hand while holding her cloak tight against the bitter
wind with her other.  He could see her brown, fawn-like eyes widen at every
noise.  To say she was not comfortable was an understatement; it appeared to
him that she had never been out in the Imperial City at night, or any city for
that matter.  Thankfully, her deep burgundy robes and cloak appeared black in
the night, and had allowed them to hide in the deep shadows as several City
Guard squads passed them in the night.  During the day, the City Guard had some
modicum of professional restraint, but at night they had been given free rein
to do as they pleased.

The third of their group was Salrissa, now wearing her full black
leather armor, which covered her head to toe, including a faceplate that left
only her piercing blue eyes and a small portion of her forehead exposed.  She
walked through the shadows like she owned them, like they were her obedient servants. 
Hoyle liked to think she had feelings for him, but he was under no illusions.  Their
time together was a release for her, and nothing more.  Her emotions were
buried deep.  But he was glad she had come.

Hoyle thought back to when they had retreated to his room in
the Red Rooster Inn after their meal to make plans.  Celia had been wary and
nervous, even with her eyelids drooping, and moved a stool over to sit by the
room’s only door.

“We’re going to have to try and use stealth to get in, which
shouldn’t be too much problem for some of us,” Hoyle began.

“Um – we?” queried Hicks “I don’t think so Hoyle.”

“Why not, you’re fair with a sword.  Only as backup mind
you.”

“You and Salrissa may work at night, but I have a day job,
and the days start when the rooster crows, whether I like it or not.” Hicks
stated.  “I’m out.”

He looked at Salrissa, who turned from looking out the
window and shrugged, “I need the exercise,” was all she said before turning to
once again look out the small window.

“There must be some other way...” Celia stammered.  “Can’t
we go to the City Guard and have them arrested?  I mean, if they did steal the items.”
She looked at him from the corner of her eye, still gripping whatever necklace
she wore beneath her robes.  He could tell she might be a bit naive and
inexperienced, but she was far from stupid.  Even though neither had mentioned
it since the encounter in the alley, Hoyle couldn’t believe how quick she had
put the pieces of the truth together from so little information.  He fingered
his earring while he thought. 

“The Goralon Merchant’s Guild, as well as their embassy over
in the government quarter, are effectively Goralon soil by treaty.  If the City
Guard so much as went onto the property without being invited, it could provoke
war with Goralon.  Or at least have them pack up and halt trade with the
Empire,” Salrissa concluded quietly.  She still had not turned from the window.

“How would they know?” Celia questioned.

“The mirrors,” was all Salrissa replied.

“Magemirrors?  But they were created to help people,” Celia
protested.  "Besides, we prefer the name felia'shilaar..." she said
the last under her breath.

“Best intentions...” Salrissa trailed off, her back still to
the room.

“I’m not sure what you mean...”

“Did you flaming
wizards,
" she threw the word
out as a curse, "ever consider what might happen if the Emperor got a hold
of these
trinkets
of yours?  Did you ever think how much power the
Empire would wield with these mirrors, and gates, and skyships?  And then your
precious Dar'Shilaar went and just handed it all over to our dear 'benevolent' Emperor
Randramas.”

Hoyle watched the exchange quietly, noting that Hicks was
staying out of it also.  He could sense a deep resentment from Salrissa, but of
course, didn’t know why. 
Another fact to remember
, he thought.

“We needed a place of safety...” Celia whispered.  She could
vaguely recall the words from one of the historical manuscripts she had studied
in Mahad’avor;

Our survival requires us to come to compromise with the lesser
of two evils.  May our children forgive us if we choose wrong, for into those
hands we will hand over the ability to stabilize, and possibly conquer the
Continent of Kaladahn.  For better or for worse, only the future will tell.

“How safe do you feel now?”  The question, with no emotion,
looked like it stung Celia somewhat.  Celia let in hang in the air, unanswered.

---o---

Now they were standing tight against a building, using it as
shelter from the wind, while watching the tower across the square.  Two
soldiers were now out front, holding their cloaks against the wind with one
hand, while resting the other on the pommels of their swords.  The windows were
still all shuttered, but light peaked around a few shutters on the lower two
floors.  The top floor was dark.

“Let’s stick with the plan, and only enter the tower if
necessary.” Hoyle said.  “Salrissa, I will need your pouch for this to work.”

Salrissa handed over a small black pouch, ornamented with a
very small shard of a black magestone; she gave a quick nod and vanished into
the shadows with a single stride.  Celia jumped slightly in surprise, turning
her head side-to-side.  She seemed shaken yet again.

“Why don’t you wait here?” Hoyle asked.

“Then what guarantee do I have that you will retrieve my
items?”

“Nothing other than my word”

“Yes, well then I’m coming,” Celia stated. 
Apparently
trust was still an issue.

“Fine, stay close, and stay quiet,” Hoyle directed and moved
out from the shadows and across the square towards the alley near the tower. 
As fast as he moved, Celia stayed within three paces of him, and was fairly
quiet considering she wasn’t in the business.  Staying in the shadows, Hoyle
worked his way to the carriage gate to the side of the tower and tapped softly
twice.

After a short wait, the gates opened a crack, and piercing
blue eyes looked out from the shadows.  Salrissa stepped back and let the two
of them into the stable yard.  Hoyle looked around, surveying the yard.  To the
right of the gate was the carriage house and stable, further into the yard
looked to be warehouses.  The tower windows on this side were also barred and
shuttered, with light peeking out from a few.  He proceeded to the carriage
house, lingering outside as he listened for guards, but he could not hear any,
so he stepped inside.

The interior was almost black as pitch, but he could see the
darker shadow that was the carriage.  He moved towards it in the dark, stopping
briefly as he heard a noise further back.  Listening he could hear the chuffing
of horses breathing in the deeper darkness, so he continued to the rear of the
carriage.  Opening the rear hatch, he confirmed that the chest with his gold
was not there. 
It was worth a shot
he thought, fingering the small key
he still had in his pocket from that morning.

“Rounds!” Salrissa warned with a whisper from near the open
doorway, as she and Celia moved into the shadows within the carriage house and
pressed their backs against the wall.  Hoyle kept one hand on the pommel of his
sword, and ducked down behind the carriage wheel in the dark.

A silhouette moved in front of the open doorway, backlit by
the meager light from the tower windows.  He turned his head side to side, a
small glow giving his scarred face a reddish cast.  Hoyle could smell the
strong cigar from where he was hiding, more than eight paces away.  The soldier
turned and walked to the gate that Salrissa had closed behind them, checked it,
and moved toward the back of the tower in no particular hurry.

Salrissa and Celia moved over towards him, Salrissa gliding
through the shadows as if she could see through them, Celia stumbling over some
uneven floor, nearly falling.  “Well?” Salrissa inquired quietly.

“It’s not here, so we’ll have to get into the tower.” He
responded.

“By it, you mean the chest or pouch containing the items, I
assume?” retorted Celia.  By the tilt of her head she was trying to see Hoyle’s
face, but he suspected that there was not enough light for a good look.

“Yes, that among other things,” was his reply.

“Wait here,” directed Salrissa as she vanished through the
doorway and into the shadows.

Hoyle counted.  It was just habit while he was waiting.  It
was part of his rule “
It is better to be careful than dead.
”  Nothing he
could think of could take more than a one hundred count that hadn’t gone
wrong.  He had yet to be proven wrong, so that became a part of his rule.  If
he got to a one hundred count before Salrissa returned, that would be his cue
to bolt.  In the past, he had only ever reached eighty-nine seconds whenever
Salrissa had told him to wait.  Tonight was no exception, reaching only a
sixty-three count before she returned.

“Follow me,” she said, and turned back the way she had come.

Hoyle and Celia carefully made their way out of the dark
carriage house and followed Salrissa’s dark shape to the back corner of the
tower and around.  The area by the back tower entrance was dark, but Hoyle
could still smell the acrid smoke of the torches.  The entire yard was dark,
but he could see the darker silhouettes of the warehouses about twenty paces
across the yard.  He saw a lumpy pile off to one side of the steps to the door,
and distracted Celia from what must be the soldier’s bodies.  Whether Salrissa
left guards alive or not was always uncertain, probably depending on whether
she took them by surprise or not.

“Shouldn’t there be guards?” asked Celia, looking around.

Ignoring Celia, he turned to the door, bent down and
retrieved his “lock resetting” hardware from a small hidden pocket inside his
boot.  Within seconds he had the door unlocked.  He pushed it open as quietly
as he could manage, peeking into what appeared to be a well lit hallway. 
Seeing no one, he opened the door all the way and led the two women into the
hall.  “Can you do something about this light?”

Salrissa swung her arm with her cloak over it, similar to a
bird’s wing, or maybe a bat’s, and the candles for the closest half of the
hallway went out in the small, but deceptively powerful gust of wind. 
“Better?” she asked quietly with an arched eyebrow.

Hoyle nodded absently and quickly took stock of the area. 
The hallway ran straight through the tower to a door at the other end which no
doubt opened to the stoop, containing the two soldiers guarding the front of
the tower.  On one side, about halfway down, a stair rose to the upper floors. 
They could smell delicious aromas from the door to their immediate right, most
likely the kitchen, and loud voices could be heard from a door on the left,
across from the base of the stairs. 

He moved quickly and quietly down the hall and peaked up the
stairs to ensure it was clear.  Noting that it was, he began to climb the steps,
the ladies following.  He was pretty sure whatever items of value were held in
the tower would be as far from street level as possible, which meant the third
floor.  It was also most likely that any high ranking guests would have
quarters on the upper-most floor, away from the day-to-day business of the
guild.  That being said, Goralonians were an odd bunch, zealously worshipping
the death and battle aspects of Voral the Father, or Benraw the Twin: war, destruction,
strength, chaos.  At least, those were some of the rumors he had heard growing
up in a small village near the border of Goralon.

Cresting the first run of stairs, he came face-to-face with
a statue of Voral’s death aspect; a muscular male form, wearing a knee length
torva with the head of a flaming skull.  The statue was in a small alcove
facing the stairs, and was probably meant as a warning for someone like him. He
ignored it, listening for noise from the doors along the length of the hallway beside
the stairs.  A second flight of stairs was obvious at the other end of the hall,
superimposed over the ones they had just come up.  The hallway was much darker
on this floor, so he could see that some of the rooms were obviously occupied
based on the light coming under the doors, but could hear no obvious sounds
from the occupants.

“Where are we going?” Celia whispered tentatively.

“Top floor.” Hoyle whispered in reply.

“Why?”

“That’s always where the good stuff is,” he replied.
“Always."

"Not
always
..." Celia said under her breath
resentfully.  The vault she had put the quafa'shilaar in was underground.

Salrissa slid past them at the top of the stairs with a look,
and swiftly moved down the hallway, briefly listening at each door she passed. 
Hoyle followed her to the base of the next flight of stairs and up.

As the trio reached the top floor, they began to hear
shouting from outside the tower.  They rounded the banister and looked along
the hall, seeing two doors at the near end and two at the far end.  Hoyle could
see flickering, multi-hued light from under one of the doors at the far end of
the hall, so he moved in that direction.  As they reached the mid-point in the
hall, with a wall to one side, and the waist-high banister along the stairs to
the other, they heard a loud crash from below.  Almost immediately, shouting
and the ringing sounds of swords clashing echoed up from below.  Then the
unholy screaming began.

---o---

What is happening?
thought Hoyle as he was forced to
cover his ears.  He watched the door with the flickering light, but nothing
seemed to change.  However, a door from behind them burst open, revealing a
large form cursing as he pushed his way through while settling his armor.  The
man looked up and met Hoyle’s eyes.  “You!” he exclaimed, and drew his sword,
almost ignoring the two women with him.  He glanced down the stairs toward the
screaming, and then advanced toward the trio, his eyes not leaving Hoyle’s.