But another familiar countenance pushed close to her, almost nose to nose. Pyllor. She smelled the sour ale on the squire’s breath.
“What are you doing out of your cage, Hothbrin? Come looking for some more lessons?” He shoved her against the wall with an angry laugh.
Dart struggled against him, but he outweighed her by two stones.
“’Course,” he slurred, “we’ll have to manage without Swordmaster Yuril. None of her coddling this time.”
His guffaw sounded more like a bark-but Dart was deaf to it, hearing only the beat of ravens’ wings behind his laugh. She tensed, remembering when another man had touched her so roughly.
Behind Pyllor, Dart saw two more of Pyllor’s friends. Dart didn’t know their names but recognized their hard eyes. She also noted the Fiery Cross emblems crudely stitched to their shirt collars.
Folks passed them on the stairs, barely noting them. Such ribaldry and hassling were not unknown among the ranks. But Dart read the mean intent in Pyllor’s eyes. The Fiery Cross bore no love for the castellan-or those who served her. Swords had been drawn over the division.
One of his companions grabbed Dart’s other shoulder. “Let’s do her?” he hissed at Pyllor, his eyes shining with malicious fire.
The second squire hesitated, half-blocking the way. “The castellan’s page-we don’t dare.”
Pyllor flat-handed him aside. His other fist knotted in Dart’s half cloak and tugged her toward an open door. “Bugger that sellwench up in her hermitage. We’re the warden’s men. She needs to learn who truly rules here.”
Dart fought against the fist in her cloak, trying to shed the garment and twist away. But her other elbow was snatched by the more exuberant of Pyllor’s two companions. The other hung back still, glancing to the stairs. But all interest still seemed caught upon the crashed flippercraft.
Dart was half-carried through a doorway into a dark, empty room. A single brazier burnt near the back, offering a meager glow.
An iron rod protruded from it, buried in the embers.
“Get your flat arse in here!” Pyllor’s friend said to their reluctant cohort.
He obeyed, caught in the wake of the other two.
“And latch the door!” Pyllor called out.
Dart stamped on the squire’s foot, desperate to escape, heart pounding in her throat. Raven wings echoed. Did they mean to rape her?
Pyllor swore and threw her deeper into the room, hard enough to trip her up. She skidded on the stone, ripping her leggings, bloodying her knee.
“Act like a skaggin’ wench…and we’ll treat you like one!”
A coarse laugh encouraged Pyllor.
The door closed behind him, sinking the room into gloom.
Pyllor’s partner crossed to the brazier, wrapped up his hand in a cloth, and pulled the rod from the coals. Its iron end glowed a fiery crimson. A branding iron. The tip was shaped into a circle bisected by crossed lines.
The symbol of the Fiery Cross.
It was not rape that they intended, but another violation of body.
“Where should we mark her?” the bearer asked. “The thigh, like we did that Moor Eld boy?”
Pyllor glared at Dart. “No. Somewhere where all will see.” He touched his cheek. “It’s time the Fiery Cross sent a message to that sellwench up in her hermitage.”
Dart scrambled back as the others laughed. She sought her only weapon. She reached down to her scraped knees, blessing her hands with her own blood. She needed Pupp.
Dart glanced around and only now realized she was alone.
Pupp was gone.
Pyllor stalked toward her. “Grab her.”
Brant knew he was being hunted.
He had sensed it for the last three levels as he descended the stairs, a pressure building behind his breastbone. He searched behind him, but the curve of the tower stairs betrayed him. All he saw was men and women in cloaks or various drapes of finery. A washerwoman with a tied bundle of linen bustled past him, almost knocking him aside. He caught the scent of soap and perfumed oil from her burden, intended for someone of higher station.
He took another step down. He was thwarted from much further progress by a tide of people heading up. He had almost reached the bottom of the tower, and some excitement seemed to be drafting folks upward, like smoke up a chimney, something about an arriving flippercraft.
Pressed against a wall, Brant finally noted the heat at his throat. His hand rose to touch the scar on his neck, then the stone resting below it. The stone wasn’t burning like the last time, flaring with a blistering fire. It was only warm, as if slightly fevered. Both curious and disturbed, he tested its black surface with his fingers.
As he stood, the stone warmed further, a match to the tension mounting in his chest. Brant took a step back up the stairs, then another. Under his fingertips, the stone heated to a toasty warmth. He reached the next landing, and a deeper burn surged, the stone becoming a coal in his fingers.
Wincing, he stopped. He remembered the daemon summoned by the stone when last it had flared. He searched all around him. Nothing.
At his throat, the stone began to cool.
No.
He sensed that whatever had been hunting him was now retreating. He could not lose it.
Brant took another step up, and the stone warmed ever so slightly. Encouraged, he hurried toward the next landing. With each step, the black stone responded, stoking higher with an inner fire. If he stopped or was slowed, it would cool again. He did not tarry, climbing two steps at a time now, caught in the flow of residents heading higher.
As he passed the next landing, Brant felt the stone suddenly lose its fiery edge. With each step farther, it cooled more.
Brant swung around and fought the tide again, heading back down, returning to the landing below.
The stone’s burn ignited again.
He left the stairs and entered the passageway.
It was nearly empty. He rushed forward, using the threaded rock like a lodestone, following the trail of heat. He was a quarter way down the hall when the stone flared to a roasting fire.
Brant gasped but knew he was close.
He yanked the cord from around his neck. He held out the necklace, letting the talisman swing. On one pass, the arc of the dangling stone suddenly stopped-halted by the backside of a molten bronze beast.
It appeared out of the air at his knees, facing away, toward a door. Its body seemed to melt and flow, constantly struggling to hold its beastly shape, half wolf, half lion. In its fierce churn, Brant sensed its fury. It wafted outward like the heat from an open forge.
Then the beast lunged away, vanishing from the touch of the stone, and through a solid door.
Brant straightened.
Then heard the scream.
Dart struggled to escape her own half cloak. It had been pulled over her head by the larger of Pyllor’s cohorts. She kicked and felt her boot strike flesh. A loud oof responded.
“Get’er legs, Ryskold!” Pyllor said.
Someone grabbed her knee.
Dart fought with a rising fury that grew to a blinding ferocity. A hand broke free of her cloak, and she raked her nails at whoever clutched her. She connected, digging deep.
A bellow of surprise erupted.
The grip loosened, and she twisted away, freeing herself-but only momentarily. Whoever she’d wounded lunged atop her, meaning to pin her with his greater weight. Dart held him off with an elbow and a hand. In the struggle, her fingers stumbled upon a familiar shape at the other’s waist.
She grabbed it and pulled.
The sword slid free of its sheath. Her attacker let loose a cry of pain, accidentally cut by his own blade.
