Authors: Barbara Ann Wright
Lord Hugo nodded, and Averie nodded with him. She cast a quick glance at him before looking to Katya. Masking the gesture as she passed a hand through her hair, Katya nodded, too, signaling that Averie would also be watching Lord Hugo.
They tethered their horses and crept toward the clearing. Katya tried to tell herself that the kidnappers wouldn’t harm Starbride. To set a trap, they needed live bait. This, of course, assumed Lord Hugo was telling the truth. If he wasn’t, he was dead, sure as the sunset.
The manor house was more dilapidated than Katya had imagined. Most of the woodwork had fallen off, leaving sad, sagging stone. The eight windows on their side stood as still and empty as a skull’s eyes but had the good fortune to be close to the forest. They snuck one by one through bushes, weeds, and overgrown shrubs until they stood against the wall near a window.
Crowe clenched his pyramid and closed his eyes. He leaned to Katya’s ear. “There is a pyramid protecting this window and the next. We must assume every gap on the first floor is so protected. I sense nothing on the windows above.”
“Can you cancel this pyramid?”
“Yes, but if the owner missed us before, he’ll know about us now.”
“There’s nothing for it.” She pulled Pennynail close to whisper in his mask’s ear. “Can you scale this wall and go in via the second story?”
He nodded. Katya let him go and signaled the others to get ready.
Maia put her bow under one arm, and Brutal took his spiked mace from his belt. Crowe lifted his pyramid, his forehead creased, and then he nodded.
Brutal grabbed the lip of the window and heaved his body inside. Once he was clear, Katya followed and drew her rapier once inside the old stone room. She and Brutal took positions beside the doorway as Crowe and Maia followed them inside.
Crowe lifted his pyramid and then shook his head. Brutal and Katya stepped out of the room to a short hallway that led to an adjacent room and then around a corner. In the other direction, the short hallway led to a longer hallway with daylight leaking down it. Katya chose the long hallway and sneaked through the still air in eerie quiet. Brutal followed her. Maia took the other path, and Crowe stayed behind Katya. Motes of dust drifted through the light, and from somewhere ahead came the rasping sound of booted feet on dusty stone. Katya and Brutal froze.
“Come out, come out, Princess,” someone called from deeper in the house. “We have a very short time in which to play.”
Katya glanced at Brutal; he led the way, Katya a step behind. In the crumbled remains of a main hall—a dining room or ballroom—four men waited. One matched the description of Lord Hugo’s stabber, and one of the others, a larger man, seemed a good fit for Cassius, but the other two were also twenty-something, and neither had a beard.
The lanky, young stabber smiled from where he stood atop of a pile of rubble. His brown hair curled across his forehead, and his brown eyes held amused contempt. Katya hung back in the hallway. A balcony ringed the large room, and the walls above it were decorated with the remains of old paintings, nice camouflage for archers.
“Well, I’m here,” Katya said, not stepping out into the open. “Who are you, and what do you want?”
The young stabber grinned. “Darren is my name, and I’ve taken great pains to get to this moment.”
“You’re about to experience great pain,” Brutal said.
Darren chuckled and crossed his arms. “We’ll see.”
“I don’t recognize your name or your face,” Katya said. “If you wanted to meet me, you could have introduced yourself at the Courtiers Ball, unless of course, you weren’t invited.”
“What a delightful attempt to try to get information from me! Or were you meaning to prick my pride?”
“Whatever I could get.” Katya hoped to stall him until her team could get in position and prayed that Pennynail would find Starbride before the fighting began.
Starbride heard Katya’s voice and paused. Her climb along the ledge had taken moments, but it had seemed like hours of inching along, trying to make her numb hands get a grip on smooth stone while she fought to maintain her balance. After she’d climbed into the house through another window, she’d started down this hallway, searching for a staircase. Darren’s voice had made her pause. She didn’t want to run into him, but Katya got her feet moving again. The thought of freedom quickened her steps nearly as much as the desire to keep Katya from walking into an ambush.
Sunlight streamed through a gap in the wall, and Starbride peeked through at a balcony surrounding a large room. Katya’s voice drifted upward, but Starbride couldn’t see the floor or any of the room’s occupants. “I don’t recognize your name or your face,” Katya said. “If you wanted to meet me, you could have introduced yourself at the Courtiers Ball, unless of course, you weren’t invited.”
Starbride failed to hear his response as a man moved past the gap, cutting off her view. He crouched, facing away from her, a crossbow at the ready. As he sidled along the balcony, his head bobbed to and fro as if searching the floor below for a clear shot.
Starbride glanced up and down the hallway and bit her lip. She couldn’t let Katya be shot by this assassin, but what to do? If she called out, she would give away the fact that she was free, and any lurking enemies could collect her and use her as a hostage. Maybe she could lead the crossbowman away? She hurried down the hallway as she thought about it and tried to ignore her throbbing head and aching side.
At the next corner, a narrow stairway stood across the hall, and a doorway onto the balcony opened just to her left around the corner. She paused, torn between running for it and trying to stop the crossbowman. If she got to Katya, she could do both. She started to move and pulled up short as the crossbowman backed from the balcony doorway, between her and the stairway. She paused in the shadows, and he didn’t seem to spot her. He was too busy staring at the balcony doorway and then looking in the other direction down the hall. He rubbed his chin as if trying to calculate the best place to position himself.
He took a step toward the stairway. Starbride had to act. Katya’s life was in her bound hands. Her bare feet made little sound as she sprinted. The crossbowman didn’t turn. She hit him full force and knocked the breath from her lungs. She hoped to push him down the stairs, but he grabbed her as he started to fall, and his crossbow thumped to the ground. She shoved as hard as she could, but he made a grab for the wall, and their legs tangled together. They fell at the top of the stairs.
The crossbowman cursed, rolled Starbride off him, and got to his knees. He grabbed her bound wrists while reaching back a fist. Starbride tried to push him away with her feet and fought the urge to scream. Agony spiked through her wrists and shoulders, and she would’ve sworn her hands were about to come off. The crossbowman slapped at her legs and drew back again to hit her, but a leather-clad arm tangled with his before he could launch the fist at her head. The crossbowman turned, and Katya’s masked man stuck a knife in his throat.
Starbride stared as blood welled around the blade and dripped on the front of her dress. She swallowed and strained away. The masked man pulled the dead man off her and laid him to the side. Starbride opened her mouth to ask about Katya, but the masked man laid a finger across the lips of his mask and then untied her wrists with long, quick fingers.
“They don’t know I’m loose,” she whispered.
He nodded, stepped back, and pulled her to her feet to eye her up and down.
“What?” For a moment, she thought he was going to remark on the hideousness of her dress. Instead, he bent and removed the dead man’s clothing quickly, as if he was used to undressing dead men. He gave her the pilfered clothes and then pointed at her dress.
She glanced from her dress to the clothes and tried to forget they belonged to a corpse. “You’re right. They’re better than what I’m wearing.” This man was on Katya’s side—Starbride supposed she had to trust him. “I’ll need help with my laces.” He nodded, and she turned. She shuddered as he unlaced her, though the mask made her more comfortable than if his face had been bare. No matter what he was feeling, she couldn’t see it, and if he wouldn’t speak, she couldn’t hear it. Gooseflesh ran over her entire body, and she fought the urge to wrap her arms around herself.
When the masked man finished with the laces, he turned his back, and she hauled the dress over her head, threw it to the floor, and shivered in her meager undergarments. She donned the dead man’s clothes as best she could, stuffing the long legs of the trousers into the large boots. The shirt hung to her knees. She tapped the masked man on the shoulder, and to her surprise, he picked up the dress and held it against his lean frame.
Starbride choked off a laugh. “Do you think it suits you?”
He draped the dress over one arm, laced his fingers together, and put the backs of his hands under his chin, tilting his head. Starbride chuckled but then paused. “They don’t know I’m loose,” she whispered again. An idea formed in her head.
He tapped the side of the mask’s nose and pointed at her, and she knew they had the same idea. “Come on,” she said. “I’ll show you where they kept me. I had a bag over my head, but you’ll have to give me your boots and gloves.”
Katya once again had to clamp her teeth on her impatience as she waited for Darren to make his move. He had to have a trick in mind. No one who talked as much as he did operated without a card up his sleeve. She’d started to tune him out when he finally said, “Enough talk. I’ve got a surprise for you, Princess.”
“Finally,” Katya whispered. “Ready flash bomb.”
“Bring her!” Darren said. One of his men went up a stairway at the back, and Katya tightened her grip on her rapier. When they brought Starbride in, she planned to hit them hard. She cleared her throat, and Brutal cleared his, signaling that he understood.
In a matter of moments, they led Starbride down the stairway. She had a bag over her head that also covered her shoulders, but there was no mistaking the dress. Blood spotted the front of it, and Katya’s temples began to pound with her pulse. Her leading foot moved, but then she paused, hearing Brutal pause beside her. Unless Katya was much mistaken, Starbride had gotten taller.
“Who’s that?” Crowe said.
Darren frowned before he hauled Starbride toward him. Her wrists were bound in front of her, and her feet were bare, but both hands and feet seemed larger and paler than they should have been. “A simple trade,” Darren said. “You for this girl.”
Katya almost said, “And what girl would this be?” but she kept herself to, “And what will you do with me once you’ve got me?”
Darren pulled a knife from his belt and waved it near the false-Starbride’s bagged head.
Behind Katya, Crowe gasped. “That knife.”
Katya didn’t have time to ask. “Ready flash bomb.”
“Time’s up,” Darren said. He pulled the hood up over a Laughing Jack mask and stared as the binding fell from Pennynail’s wrists. With one quick motion, Pennynail stabbed Darren in the shoulder with a hidden knife.
“Now,” Katya said.
“Temperance!” Crowe yelled, and something flew over Katya’s head. She averted her eyes, hoping Pennynail heard the signal. Too many enemies closed their eyes when someone said, “Flash bomb!” The residue of the bright flash lit the inside of her closed eyelids, and one person cried out in pain.
Katya and Brutal ran toward where Pennynail wrestled with Darren. One of the other men held his face and shook his head, but the other two, Cassius and one of the unnamed fellows, leapt forward, their faces clear of confusion and pain.
In the corner, a crossbowman stood from behind a pile of rubble, his weapon raised. He fell backward with a yelp as a green-fletched arrow appeared in his chest as if by magic. Maia had reached the balcony. Katya heard another cry from the rubble pile behind her.
Katya reached her opponent just as he drew his sword. She launched an attack, but he countered and dropped into a defensive stance. She lunged; he blocked again and shifted position amongst the rubble, trying to get higher. Katya stepped lightly onto a pile of bricks, and he pressed his attack while she was off balance. She blocked his sword and then kicked his knee, making him stagger. He recovered quickly and slashed, slicing her calf in a quick arc of pain. She climbed farther up the rubble, and he jumped after her.
He hacked, using the strength in his taller body, but she didn’t play his game. She left off blocking and stayed ahead of his swings, turning his lunges into stumbles. Nearby, Katya heard Brutal roar, and one of his opponents went flying behind hers, the man’s chest a ruin. Her opponent tripped, and Katya ducked under his halfhearted slash. She stuck one leg out behind her as she stabbed forward and sank her rapier into his heart. His eyes rolled as he slumped, and she slid her sword from his chest.
Pennynail had Darren on his knees with both arms behind his back. Katya gestured at the gown over his usual leather. “Tell me you found more than just the dress.”
He nodded and jerked Darren’s arms higher. Darren twisted, his face creased with pain and anger. “Let go of me, peasant!”
“That’s always a dead giveaway,” Brutal said. Not even breathing hard, he held Cassius in a chokehold. Cassius’s face went from red to purple, and he tugged on Brutal’s arms to no avail.